Retinoblastoma management: a systematic review

Abstract

Retinoblastoma is a rare cancer that occurs in children under 5 years of age from which leukocoria and strabismus are the characteristic signs of this disease. For every 16,000 to 18,000 newborns worldwide, one will get retinoblastoma, while at the Latin American context there are no reported data due to scant research. Therefore, the reason for this research is to describe the management of retinoblastoma. Trauma, human papillomavirus (HPV), and genetic alterations in the RB1 gene are possible causative factors for retinoblastoma. The diagnosis is based on the clinic, genetic tests, imaging tests and in cases of metastasis, a cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) aspiration is performed through lumbar puncture. There is another method such as non-invasive prenatal diagnosis (NIPD), here the main diagnosis is indirect ophthalmoscopy. The treatment is directly related to the evolution of the disease using different methods such as enucleation, cryotherapy, chemotherapy and radiotherapy that can be used individually or in combination to improve the quality of life of the patient; however, enucleation followed by chemotherapy remain as the main method of treatment.