[Radiotherapy of nasopharyngeal carcinoma--analysis of 1379 patients]

This paper presents 1379 patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma treated in our hospital from March 1958 to December 1978. The stage I and II lesions comprised 22% and stage III and IV lesions, 78%. 220 KV X-ray was used before 1960 and 60Co was predominant from 1961 through 1978. The overall 5 year survival rate was 41.4% (571/1379). Young adults and female patients gave better results. The 5 year survival rate was, according to pathological type, 45.1% for poorly differentiated squamous cell carcinoma and 13% for adenocarcinoma; according to clinical stage, 85.7% for stage I lesion, 59.5% for stage II, 45.8% and 29.2% for stages III and IV; according to period of treatment, 31.3% in the sixties and 48.6% in the seventies; according to tumor dose at the primary focus, 48.2% for 40-49 Gy, 55.6% for 60-69 Gy and 67.3% for 90 Gy or more; according to with or without prophylactic radiation in the neck region, 53.8% for the former and 23% for the latter. It implies that prophylactic radiation of the neck is necessary regardless of the presence of cervical lymph node metastasis or not. For those who had residual tumor at 70 Gy, the total dose may be boosted to more than 90 Gy with the cone down technic or the dose, at which the primary lesion disappears grossly, is added with 20 Gy. The common complications are radiation myelitis, trismus and otitis media. As in certain patients, the lesion would still recur 5 years after radiotherapy, the authors believe that the nasopharyngeal cancer patients should be followed for ten years at least.