Two types of tumour sensitivity test compared for platinum derivatives

For early passages of 15 human tumours grown in nude mice two types of test for prediction of sensitivity to cytostatic drugs were carried out for four platinum compounds. The subrenal capsule assay of Bogden was not found to be useful for these early passages, since the response of duplicate tests was not very different from randomly distributed results. The clonogenic assay as described by Hamburger and Salmon gave reproducible results on the drug sensitivity of those tumour cells that grew colonies in vitro. However, in a limited number of cases irregular colony growth occurred. Lower drug concentrations were apparently more effective in killing cells than higher concentrations. From the replicate test results it became clear that such results are not a reliable indicator of drug sensitivity. Furthermore, the critical drug concentrations for optimal testing of drug effectiveness is probably not well represented by a uniform relation to peak plasma level.