The role of chemotherapy in invasive cancer of the cervix uteri: current standards and future prospects.
For many decades, invasive cervical cancer has been considered more or less chemoresistant and chemotherapy has been limited to patients presenting with overt metastatic disease or those suffering from pelvic recurrences which could not be advised to secondary local treatments. However, more than 20 different single agents are considered active in cervical cancer. Recent cooperative clinical trials have demonstrated the superiority of multi-modality strategies for patients with high-risk cervical cancer. These studies integrating chemotherapy as part of the primary therapeutic concept have provided the most significant improvement of locally advanced disease in more than three decades. This review summarizes current standards of chemotherapy for invasive cervical cancer and shows new developments which may improve systemic treatment of the disease.
Rein
D T
DT
Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, University of Düsseldorf Medical Center, 40001 Düsseldorf, Germany. Rein@med.uni-duesseldorf.de
Kurbacher
C M
CM
D000970:Antineoplastic Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D017024:Chemotherapy, Adjuvant; D002986:Clinical Trials as Topic; D003131:Combined Modality Therapy; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D009361:Neoplasm Invasiveness; D015996:Survival Rate; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D002583:Uterine Cervical Neoplasms / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000401:mortality / Q000532:radiotherapy
D000970:Antineoplastic Agents