[Comparison of the effectiveness of preoperative radiation and thermoradiation therapy in treating breast cancer].

Based on an analysis of the 3- and 5-year results of the combined treatment of 865 patients with breast cancer using 4 variants of radiation exposure in the preoperative period the following aspects are discussed: 1) the conventional variant of gamma-beam therapy at summary doses of 40-45 Gy is not an optimum variant of preoperative irradiation; 2) better results are achieved with the preoperative irradiation of the affected breast and zones of regional metastasis at a single dose of 4 Gy and a summary dose of 20 Gy; 3) a marked tendency towards achieving still better results of treatment and a statistically significant decrease in the frequency of distant metastases detected in the first 2 years after treatment are noted with the use of two other variants of preoperative exposure: an increase in the doses in tumor growth zones up to the level which is equivalent to a carcinocidal dose and a short course of preoperative irradiation (20 Gy) under the conditions of local UHF-hyperthermia.