Palliation of pelvic and head and neck cancer with paclitaxel and a novel radiotherapy regimen.

Purpose: In patients with advanced malignancies, local palliation is undertaken if the patient is not a candidate for aggressive intervention. We developed a prospective study using the same radiotherapy schedule as the Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG) 85-02 with the addition of the radiosensitizer paclitaxel to evaluate its effect on the tumor response rate, palliation of symptoms, and toxicity.

Methods: Twenty subjects with advanced pelvic or head and neck cancer were enrolled after signing an informed consent.

Predicting patients at low probability of requiring postmastectomy radiation therapy.

Background: Postmastectomy radiation therapy (PMRT) is recommended for patients with four or more positive lymph nodes (LN+). Given the ramifications of PMRT for immediate reconstruction, we sought to create a model using preoperative and intraoperative factors to predict which patients with a positive sentinel lymph node will have less than four LN+.

Methods: The database from a prospective multicenter study of 4,131 patients was used for this analysis.

The relationship of radiation pneumonitis to treated lung volume in breast conservation therapy.

Breast conservation therapy has become a common modality for therapy of early stage breast cancer. Most studies of primary lung irradiation correlate the risk of pneumonitis with the volume of lung treated. It is proposed that the lung volume treated during tangential radiation of the intact breast may be calculated from a measurement of the central lung distance.

Hodgkin's lymphoma in adults--clinical features.

One hundred (100) patients were treated in the Department of Radiation Oncology, James Graham Brown Cancer Center, University of Louisville School of Medicine, from 1980-1994. All patients were evaluated and staged according to the accepted guidelines at the treatment times. All patients were followed on a strict follow-up schedule for the outcome of treatment including late effects.

Pediatric Hodgkin's disease.

Thirty-two patients were treated in this Department from 1981-1992. The median age was 14 years (range 4 years to 17 years). There are 6 patients (19%) below the age of 10 years, 16 patients (50%) between 11 years to 15 years, and 10 patients (31%) above 16 years.

A phase III comparison of radiation therapy with or without recombinant beta-interferon for poor-risk patients with locally advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (RTOG 93-04).

Purpose: The results of Phase I/II data testing beta-interferon with radiation therapy in a non-small-cell lung cancer population were promising. Based on these data, the Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG) initiated a Phase III trial to test the efficacy of beta-interferon in poor-risk patients with Stages IIIA and IIIB non-small-cell lung carcinoma.

Methods: Between September 1994 and March 1998, 123 patients were accrued to this trial.