[Long-term repeatable chemotherapy for patients with advanced pancreatic cancer]

At present, the advanced pancreatic cancer is known to be one of the most resistant malignancies on chemotherapy. To improve the efficacy of chemotherapy, we shifted the aim of chemotherapy from a tumor regression to long-term survival, and sought for a repeatable regimen with little toxicity. Some of the novel (repeatable) regimens used a combination of 5-FU/S-1, CDDP and paclitaxel performed for 10 patients with advanced pancreatic cancer (4 cases of Stage IVa and 6 cases of Stage IVb). As a result, the survival ratios of one and two years were 85.7% and 22.9%, respectively. The efficacy rate was 50% (5 cases of PR and 5 cases of NC). Hematological adverse reactions over grade 3 were observed in 8 out of 10 cases, although the decrease of platelet count was observed only in 2 cases (grade 3 and 4). The majority of hematological adverse reactions over grade 3 were leukocytepenia and anemia which were easy to control safely. All of non-hematological adverse reactions were observed under grade 2 and did not disrupt the maintenance of chemotherapy.