[Relapses of malignant nonseminomatous germinal testicular tumors]

18 relapses of non seminomatous germ cell cancer of the testis are studied, among a group of 112 patients treated from 1974 to 1978, of which 90 are in complete remission. The study of these cases shows the bad prognosis value of yolk sac tumor component at histological examination. Relapses are more frequent in the stages with lymph node involvement treated by retroperitoneal lymphadenectomy followed by chemotherapy without cis-platinum. Cis-platinum chemotherapy decreases relapse rate in theses stages and increases complete remission rate in metastatic stages.