Arif Moin Quraishi, Kausar Bano, Muhammad Abbas Khokhar, Samina Qama, Muhammad Akram, Muhammad Tahir.
Response to Induction Chemotherapy with Cisplatin and 5-Flurouracil in Locally Advanced Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Esophagus.
Pak J Med Health Sci Jan ;12(2):778-80.

Background: Esophageal cancer is considered a serious malignancy because of its extremely aggressive nature and poor survival rates. Its treatment depends on stage, for locally advanced disease treatment is still evolving and long term survival rates are very poor. Aim: To evaluate the response of induction chemotherapy in patients of locally advanced squamous cell carcinoma of esophagus . Methodology: Fifty consecutive Patients meeting inclusion criteria were enrolled for the study from Oncology Department Jinnah Hospital Lahore. Selected patients received chemotherapy with Cisplatin 75mg/m2 on day 1 and 5-flurouracil 750mg/m2/day continuous infusion from day1 to day5, repeated every three weeks for a total of 4 cycles . Response assessment was done after completion of planned therapy and it was documented as either complete response (CR) or Partial response (PR) or Stable Disease (SD) or Progressive Disease (PD) according to Standard Method of "Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors (RECIST 1.1 )" with CT scan. Results: The mean age of the study population was 58.02+-9.24 years. 68% of patients were male . Nine patients (18%) had clinical stage II (T3, N0-1, M0) disease, while majority 31( 62% ) had clinical stage III (T3, N1-2, M0) disease, and stage IV A (T4, N0-2, M0) was present in 10(20%) patients . Most common primary tumor lesion was T3 (80 %), and nodal involvement was present in 33(6 6% ) of the patients . Over all response rate was 38% (p=0.009) with only two patient (4%) achieving CR and 17(34 %) patients had partial response (p<0.005 ).Another nineteen (38 %) patients showed stable disease, thus making the clinical benefit rate (CR+PR+SD) of 76% (p<0.005) . Conclusion: Induction chemotherapy has fair response rates in patients with locally advanced squamous cell carcinoma of esophagus.

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