One- and two-year overall survival following stereotactic body radiotherapy versus conventional radiotherapy for pancreatic cancer: a systematic review and meta-analysis
Bibliographic record
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Pancreatic cancer remains one of the most aggressive malignancies with a dismal prognosis. Both stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) and conventional radiotherapy (CRT) are used in pancreatic cancer treatment, however, there is a lack of robust evidence comparing their efficacy, particularly in terms of 1-year and 2-year overall survival (OS). METHODS: We systematically searched PubMed, Embase, Web of Science, and the Cochrane Library (up to March 2025) for head-to-head comparative studies evaluating SBRT versus CRT in pancreatic cancer under the PRISMA 2020 guideline. Random-effects meta-analyses were used to pool 1- and 2-year OS rates, with heterogeneity test assessed. Prespecified subgroup and sensitivity analyses examined the influence of study design, treatment intent, chemotherapy use, and outlier impact. Publication bias was evaluated using funnel plots and Egger's test. Study quality was assessed using the Newcastle-Ottawa Scale, and the overall review process was appraised using the AMSTAR 2 tool. RESULTS: Twelve retrospective studies comprising 6566 patients were included. SBRT significantly improved 1-year OS compared to CRT (logit OR = 0.43, 95% CI: 0.26-0.60; I 2 = 22.5%), corresponding to an OR of 1.54. Subgroup analyses stratified by disease stage, chemotherapy regimen, and study design consistently favored SBRT. The prediction interval (OR: 1.14-13.50) supported the robustness of the pooled effect. Cumulative meta-analysis demonstrated a progressively increasing survival advantage of SBRT over CRT from 2015 to 2023. For 2-year OS, SBRT also showed a significant benefit over CRT (logit OR = 0.33, 95% CI: 0.02-0.64; P = 0.039), equivalent to an OR of 1.39. No evidence of publication bias was found (Egger's test P = 0.811). CONCLUSION: SBRT is associated with superior 1- and 2-year OS versus CRT in pancreatic cancer. These findings warrant further prospective validation to optimize integration in contemporary treatment algorithms.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.018 | 0.036 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.025 | 0.056 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.008 | 0.008 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.004 | 0.002 |
| Open science | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Research integrity | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.003 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".