Article
Preliminary results of the treatment of advanced oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma after ablative surgery in combination with reduced external beam radiation therapy and an adjuvant image adapted brachytherapy boost
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Published: | July 6, 2010 |
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Aim: Treatment of advanced oropharyngeal head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC) is still controversial. Two maior aspects of the therapy are besides oncological outcome function and toxicity. Image adapted brachytherapy (IABT) elicits the possibility to boost the primary tumour side, thereby sparing radiation dose.
Methods: In a retrospective analysis a group of patients suffering advanced oropharyngeal HNSCC were investigated for overall survival, disease-free survival and posttherapeutic function and toxicity.
Results: Twenty-three patients were enrolled in this study. All patients were treated from 2006 to 2009. The median follow-up was 17 months. Two patients died cancer related, seventeen patients are alive and four patients are unknown. Of those seventeen patients four patients had a recurrence. Swallowing, speech and breathing were in two thirds of our patients normal. Half of our patients had no toxicities; the rest suffered only grade 1 to 2 toxicities.
Conclusions: These results underline the oncologic necessity of a combination with IABT and a reduced external beam radiation therapy following ablative surgery to preserve function and reduce toxicity. The first results on the survival of our study group are encouraging, but up to now no definitive answer on the benefit of our patients with oropharyngeal HNSCC can be made in comparison to standard therapy.