[Intra-arterial versus intra-venous infusion as a preoperative chemotherapy for bone and soft tissue sarcomas]

The literatures concerning intra-arterial versus intra-venous infusion as a preoperative chemotherapy for bone and soft tissue sarcomas were reviewed in this paper. The initial purpose of the therapies are to give the surgeons useful and helpful preparation for limb salvage surgery. Otherwise, they are also useful to evaluate the efficacy of the chemotherapeutic agents. However, it takes a few months for the therapy to be able to evaluate the response to the tumors and the therapy do not always have good response, therefore, it is important to pay a great care in performing the therapy. From the literatures, it is difficult to clarify the differences of each methods because of the variable histological results. Some authors report the higher local concentration of the agents in intra-arterial infusion. Arterial infusion have to be indicated as a locally useful method with a attention to systemic therapy.