Gynecologic cancers

In conclusion, significant advances have been made in ovarian cancer. Specifically, these relate to the success of paclitaxel and platinum-based regimens. The appropriate scheduling, dosing, and the selection of carboplatin vs cisplatin remains controversial. The role of interval debulking surgery is still investigational and we remain cautiously optimistic as to its long-term benefit. The progress in the delivery of chemotherapy to patients with cervical carcinoma, endometrial carcinoma, vaginal carcinoma, and vulvar carcinoma has been slowed by the paucity of prospective-randomized trials. Although numerous single institution non-randomized trials show promising regimens, they lack significant power and appropriate study design to prove meaningful. Our goals in the future should be to try to enter most of these patients into national collaborative studies where significant conclusions can be made because of appropriate study design and adequate patient numbers.