Protocol of the HISTOTHERM study: assessing the response to hyperthermia and hypofractionated radiotherapy in recurrent breast cancer.

Introduction: Breast cancer is globally the leading cancer in women, and despite the high 5-year survival rate the most frequent cause of cancer related deaths. Surgery, systemic therapy and radiotherapy are the three pillars of curative breast cancer treatment. However, locoregional recurrences frequently occur after initial treatment and are often challenging to treat, amongst others due to high doses of previous radiotherapy treatments.

Hyperhydration of Cancers: A Characteristic Biophysical Trait Strongly Increasing O, CO, Glucose and Lactate Diffusivities, and Improving Thermophysical Properties of Solid Malignancies.

Cancers are complex, heterogeneous, dynamic and aggressive diseases exhibiting a series of characteristic biophysical traits which complement the original biological hallmarks of cancers favouring progressive growth, metastasis, and contributing to immune evasion and treatment resistance. One of the prevalent differences between most solid tumors and their corresponding, healthy tissues is a significantly higher water content (hyperhydration) in cancers. As a consequence, cancers have distinctly higher (Fick's) diffusion coefficients D [cm s] for the respiratory gases O and CO, the key substrate glucose, and for the oncometabolite lactate.