Abstract
The present study assessed the efficacy and toxicity of definitive extended-field intensity-modulated radiotherapy (EF-IMRT) plus concurrent chemotherapy in cervical cancer. A total of 48 patients with cervical cancer received the planning target volume between 39.6 and 50.4 Gy in 1.8-2.0 Gy daily fractions, while the enlarged pelvic and/or para-aortic nodes were treated with a total dose of 55-60 Gy in 2.0-2.4 Gy daily fractions using simultaneous integrated boost-IMRT. All patients underwent high dose-rate brachytherapy. Concurrent to EF-IMRT, nedaplatin was administered weekly at a median dose of 30 mg/m(2) (range, 25-40 mg/m(2)) for 5 weeks with a total of 150 mg/m(2). Of the 48 patients, 46 patients exhibited initial complete responses and 2 patients had partial responses, with a response rate of 100%. After 4-24 months of treatment, 12 patients (27.08%) had local and/or distant failure and 39 patients (81.25%) were alive at the last follow-up. The 12-month overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) were 87.5 and 75.8%, respectively, while the 24-month OS and DFS were 69.7 and 49.7%, respectively. Grade ≥3 acute neutropenia and thrombcytopenia occurred in 20 (41.7%) and 4 (8.3%) patients, respectively, while 2 patients (4.2%) developed grade ≥3 diarrhea and 2 (4.2%) had grade ≥3 late toxicities. However, no patients exhibited grade ≥3 vomiting. Thus, concurrent nedaplatin chemotherapy with definitive EF-IMRT was effective and relatively safe for treating patients with cervical cancer. Furthermore, EF-IMRT was able to deliver ≤60 Gy to enlarged para-aortic and/or pelvic nodes using simultaneous integrated boost without increased acute and late gastrointestinal toxicity.