[Cancer chemotherapy today and in the future]

The results which are obtained by means of the chemotherapy of cancer during a forty-year history lie behind our expectations. Nevertheless the chemotherapy of cancer is to be used curatively in about 15 per cent of all sorts of tumours, and a palliative effect can be expected in about 40% of all tumorous diseases. It must also not be forgotten that the chemotherapy of cancer has stimulated the oncologic basic research as well as the clinical oncology and is continuing to stimulate it. There are furthering and promising conceptions for the future development of chemotherapy of cancer which are based on the rapid increase of knowledge on the part of the oncologic basic research. There is no doubt that the advance of the oncologic basic research can be introduced into clinical practice only on the way of chemotherapy of cancer. In all other conceptions of the chemotherapy of cancer the patient's right to a high quality of life must not be forgotten. Here a change of thinking with regard to the positions of the past is necessary.