Staging systems and nomograms in soft tissue sarcoma: outcome prediction by categorization or personalization?

Soft tissue sarcomas (STS) are rare cancers that most commonly develop in the extremities and trunk, but can develop in any location throughout the body. Similar to other cancers, staging systems have been available, but for STS these have historically been criticized as inadequate and poorly applicable to daily clinical practice. In 2018, the American Joint Cancer Committee’s (AJCC) TNM staging system was updated (8^th edition) with changes such as separation by tumor location and categorization of all node-positive disease as Stage 4.