Epidemiology and Outcome of Solitary Fibrous Tumors of the Pleura. A Multicenter Study.

Retrospective observational study on patients with SFPT in the German spoken part of Switzerland between 2000 and 2011 (approximately 300 patients):

Phase 1) Information leaflet (letter of invitation) from study center (University Hospital of Zurich) to the institutes for pathology from all university, cantonal and city hospitals in the German spoken part of Switzerland. Patient recruitment performed by medical staff from the aforementioned institutes for pathology.

Phase 2) Obtaining first orally (by telephone) and thereafter written informed consent from the patients performed by medical staff from the aforementioned institutes for pathology.

Phase 3) After written and oral consent has been given, a doctoral candidate (member of the study group, student of the University of Zurich) will perform the data entry based on clinical and histological records locally at each external institute for pathology (no patient record files will be copied or transferred in original to the University Hospital of Zurich). Data entry in the electronic case report from (excel file on study laptop) will be performed with anonymous data only. Hence, each patient will have a study number containing the treating hospital, year of diagnosis and a consecutive number (e.g. KSSG-2011-1, KSSG-2011-2, STZ-2007-1, STZ-2007-2, ...). No names or birth dates will appear in the case report form.

Provided that informed consent is given, patient follow-up will be performed by contacting the primary care physician (general physician or family doctor) by telephone, which is handled by the doctoral candidate.