What is the latest concept of chondrosarcoma of the spine?

  Chondrosarcoma is the most common primary malignant bone tumor after osteosarcoma and Ewing sarcoma. The International Health Organization (WHO) defines chondrosarcoma as a group of locally aggressive or malignant tumors that arise from cartilage stroma and have different morphological features and biological behavior. They can be classified into central, peripheral, mesenchymal, clear-cell and dedifferentiated types.  Chondrosarcoma most often occurs between 30 and 70 years of age, and is rare in those under 20 years of age. There is a tendency to involve the trunk bones, accounting for about 45% of cases. The iliac bone is the most frequent site, accounting for approximately 20% of all cases, followed by the femur (15%) and humerus (10%). The incidence of the spine is about 10%. The male:female ratio is approximately 2:1. The spine is mostly central and borderline, and a few are secondary to endogenous chondrosarcoma, osteochondroma, or osteochondromatosis, becoming secondary to chondrosarcoma.  The clinical manifestation of chondrosarcoma lacks specificity and mostly presents as slowly developing pain, when the tumor compresses the spinal cord or neurology producing corresponding clinical symptoms such as pain and paralysis. If the tumor is large or superficially located, a hard mass may be palpated on the body surface.  The imaging of chondrosarcoma is characterized by osteolytic lesions with scattered calcified plaques, and the extent of bone destruction, marginal sclerosis and calcified foci can be seen on CT.  MRIT2-weighted images of the tumor show a more characteristic lobulated high signal lesion.  The final diagnosis requires CT-guided puncture. Incisional biopsy should be avoided due to the high internal pressure of the tumor. Chondrosarcoma can be classified as grade 1 to 3 with increasing malignancy according to its malignancy, and grade 4 is dedifferentiated chondrosarcoma with the highest malignancy. The prognosis of the tumor correlates with the histologic grade, and the higher the malignancy, the worse the prognosis.  Since chondrosarcoma is not sensitive to conventional radiotherapy and chemotherapy, complete surgical resection remains the preferred treatment. Therefore, complete surgical resection remains the preferred treatment modality. The current international recommendation for resection is a wide range or marginal whole-block resection to reduce recurrence. Therefore, sometimes it is necessary to sacrifice important tissues and organs such as nerve roots and large blood vessels to ensure the border of resection. Therefore, the surgery is difficult and risky with high complication rate. Recurrence of chondrosarcoma can occur after 10-15 years after surgery, so survival for 5 years does not mean that the tumor is cured.  If the surgery is not completely resected, or if the tumor is resected via tumor, adjuvant radiotherapy should be applied after surgery, and the dose of radiotherapy should not be less than 60-65 Gy. For unresectable chondrosarcoma, in recent years, there are reports of cases in which a long time control is obtained by applying high-dose radiotherapy alone, which is worthy of attention.