Treatment Results of Esophageal Carcinoma Treated by Radiation Therapy / 대한방사선종양학회지

PURPOSE: To determine treatment protocol for inoperable esophageal cancer patients, we evaluated survival rate and prognostic factors. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We evaluated esophageal cancer treated by curative or palliative aim in KCCH from 1992 to 1996, retrospectively. Recurrent or underdose case below 40 Gy were excluded. The number of male and female were 35 and 5, respectively. Thirty-eight patients were squamous carcinoma and 2 patients were not biopsy proven. Ten patients were treated with radiation therapy and chemotherapy. Median dose of radiation therapy was 59.4 Gy and the range was 40-60 Gy. RESULTS:The median survival is 6.5 months and 1-year survival rate was 28.3%. Age, location, radiation dose and chemotherapy were not significant prognostic factors. Median survivals of patients with below stage III and over stage IVA were 7.6 and 6.2 months respectively, but it is not significant. CONCLUSION:The survival for esophageal cancer is very poor. For patients with curative aim, chemotherapy must be considered. For patients with palliative aim, short-term external beam radiation therapy and/or brachytherapy must be considered.

The Stucture of Korean Radiation Oncology in 1997 / 대한방사선종양학회지

PURPOSE: To measure the basic structural characteristics of radiation oncology facilities in Korea during 1997 and to compare personnel, equipments and patient loads between Korea and developed countries. METHOD AND MATERIALS: Mail serveys were conducted in 1998 and data on treatment machines, personnel and performed new patients were collected. Responses were obtained from the 100 percent of facilities. The consensus data of the whole contry were summarized using Microsoft Excel program. RESULTS: In Korea during 1997, 42 facilities delivered megavoltage radiation theraphy with 71 treatment machines, 100 radiation oncologists, 26 medical physicist, 205 technologists and 19,773 new patients. Eighty nine percent of facilities in Korea had linear accelators at least 6 MeV maxium photon energy. Ninety five percent of facilities had simulators while five percent of facilities had no simulator. Ninety one percent of facilities had computer planning systems and eighty three percent of facilities reported that they had a written quality assurace program. Thirty six percent of facilities had only one radiation oncologist and thirty eight percent of facilities had no medical physicists. The median of the distribution of annual patients load of a facility, patients load per a machine, patients load per a radiation oncologist, patients load per a therapist and therapists per a machine in Korea were 348 patients per a year, 263 patients per a machine, 171 patients per a radiation oncologis, 81 patients per a therapist, and 3 therapists per a machine respectively. CONCLUSION: The whole scale of the radiation oncology departments in Korea was smaller than Japan and USA in population ratio regard. In case of hardware level like linear accelerators, simulators and computer planning systems, there was no big diffrences bewteen Korea and USA. The patients loads of radiation oncologists and therapists had no significient differences as compared with USA. However, it was desirable to consider the part time system in USA because there were a lot of hospitals which did not employ medical physicists.

The Results of Radiation Therapy in Locally Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer / 대한치료방사선과학회지

PURPOSE: This study was done to evaluate the survival rate and prognostic factors of patients with inoperable non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) treated with radiation therapy. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A retrospective analysis was undertaken of 62 patients who had inoperable NSCLC treated with radiation therapy from January 1991 through December 1993. According to AJCC staging, stage III A was 14 patients and stage IIIB was 48 patients. Forty Gy to 70.2Gy to the primary tumor site was delivered with daily fractions of 1.8Gy or 2Gy, 5 days per week. Thirty-seven patients received neoadjuvant chemotherapy. RESULTS: Complete, partial and no response to radiation therapy were 3 patients, 34 patients and 25 patients, respectively. The median survival period of all patients was 11 month. One year survival rate, 2 year survival rate and 5 year survival rate for all patients were 45.0%, 14.3%, and 6.0% respectively. The median survival period was 6.5 months in stage IIIA and 13 months in stage IIIB. One year survival rates were 28.6% in stage IIIA and 50.3% in stage IIIB. In univariaite analysis, prognostic factors affecting survival were T-staging, AJCC staging, and response after radiation therapy (P<0.05). Pretreatment peformance status affected survival but was not statistically significant (0.05

Primary Radiation Therapy of Malignant Salivary gland Tumors by Conventional Megavoltage Irradiation: Korea Cancer Center Hospital / 대한치료방사선과학회지

Retrospective analysis of survival rates was undertaken in the patients of 58 cases treated with conventional radiation therapy for malignant salivary gland tumors between January 1975 and December 1984 in Korea Cancer Center Hospital (KCCH). They were patients whose long-term follow-up was possible and who had refused surgery or had had recurrences postoperatively. Out of 58 patients, 25 patients (43.1%) had mucoepidermoid carcinomas and 24 patients (41.3%) adenoid cystic carcinoma. Total actuarial survival rates at 5 years and 10 years were 68.2% and 31.8% respectively, but disease-free survival rates, 43.2% and 13.0%, respectively. According to TNM stage, the survival rates at 5 years were 86.5% in T1, 40.0% in T2 + T3, and 0% in T4. In terms of histologic types, 5 years disease-free survival rate of adenoid cystic carcinomas (40.1%) was lower than that of mucoepidermoid carcinomas (49.8%) but overall survival rate (77.3%) was much higher than that of mucoepidermoid carcinomas (51.5%). Therefore, we concluded that the patients, who had had disease after failure of treatment, could survive during a certain period of time and their alive times were 2 years on the average. There was a difference in survival rates in the mucoepidermoid carcinomas in terms of histological grade of differentiation and it was a arbiter in prognosis: 5 YSR of low-grade was 78.8% and higher 2 times than that of high-grade. There was no difference in survival rates according to location and sex. The number of patients having minor salivary gland tumors was 6 cases and their actuarial 5 YSR was 32.3%. Consequently, prognostic factors which influence the survival rates of patients with malignant salivary gland tumors are thought to be 1) histological ubtypes 2) T and N staging (AJCC) 3) histological grade, especially in mucoepidermoids.