[Cisplatin or carboplatin, that is the question]

Platine-based chemotherapy agents are major drugs in oncology and are currently used in most solid malignancies. Of these, cisplatin has been the most widely used over past years. Its efficacy and toxicity have been both well documented in the literature. Carboplatin has a rather different toxicity profile and seems to be better tolerated than cisplatin. This might potentially impact on quality of life. Carboplatin has been assessed for treatment of most malignancies in which cisplatin has demonstrated its efficacy. This paper aims at reviewing and comparing the current indications in terms of efficacy and toxicity of cisplatin and carboplatin. Although cisplatin has demonstrated its superiority over carboplatin for treatment of lung cancers and germ-cell tumors, the tolerance of carboplatin is better than that of cisplatin. This might be taken into account for patients treated with non-curative attempt. Further studies should compare both chemotherapy agents for quality of life. Of course, carboplatin remains widely used for patients who are contra-indicated for cisplatin.