Tratamiento concomitante con gemcitabina y radioterapia en pacientes con carcinoma epidermoide locorregionalmente avanzado de cabeza y cuello: Estudio fase II

background: surgery, radiotherapy or radiotherapy alone (rta) constitute conventional treatment regimes for advanced stages of squamous cell carcinoma originating in the head and neck mucosa. nevertheless, the results in advanced regional carcinoma (arc) are disappointing. the chemotherapy - radiotherapy (cht - rt) association has shown to be superior to rta in irresectable disease and in resectable disease it could substitute initial surgery as a rescue alternative. objective: our objective is to report the response rate and toxicity of concurrent treatment with gemcitabine and radiotherapy (grt) in patients with arc. in a prospective design, patients with arc received concurrent grt; the global, complete and partial response rate as well as toxicity were assessed. material and methods: 15 patients were included, 5 women and 10 men, 73% in stage iva; 13/15 showed a global response (87%), a complete response was observed in 9 cases (60%) (rc) and 2 showed progress. results: all patients included showed toxicity, the most frequent one was level 4 mucositis in 46%, of this 40% required nutritional support by catheter or gastrostomy. one patient in rc died due to sepsis. none of them suspended treatment. conclusion: the grt association offers a complete response rate of 60%; nevertheless morbidity was not insignificant; randomized studies with a larger number of patients will be required to allow us to outline the optimal therapeutic scheme.