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By Ellen Gullett
Researchers from the Indiana University School of Medicine (IUSM) and several other universities have demonstrated a new, more effective way to treat cervical cancer. The findings from five clinical trials are going to change the way the disease is treated, according to an announcement from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) that is to be mailed to thousands of physicians throughout the United States.
The National Cancer Institute (NCI) is advising physicians to strongly consider adding the chemotherapy drug cisplatin to radiation therapy in the treatment of invasive cervical cancer.
Until now, surgery or radiation therapy alone has been considered the standard treatment for this form of cancer. The New England Journal of Medicine will publish three of the studies next month but have released them via its Web site due to the clinical significance. Dr. Fred Stehman, chairman of the IUSM Department Obstetrics and Gynecology, is chairman of the protocol committee for the Gynecologic Oncology Group (GOG), one of several NCI-sponsored networks that conduct trials jointly using the same protocols. The GOG enrolled the majority of patients in the five cervical cancer trials (1,506 of 1,912 total patients). Stehman led IU's participation in the trials and is an author of one of the studies. "These findings will change the way all patients with cervical cancer are treated in North America," he said. "This is the first group of studies to demonstrate that the theoretical advantage of adding two different treatments at the same time can be translated into a real survival advantage for patients."
IUSM was one of several institutions that showed it is more effective to treat cervical cancer with combined chemotherapy/radiation treatment. Stehman said that after three years of following patients who volunteered for the studies, there was a clear benefit for the women who received the cisplatin/radiation combination.
The five different studies produced very similar findings. In all of the studies, patients had cervical cancer that had spread locally (within the cervix) or regionally (within the pelvis).
"These findings are clear and remarkably consistent," said Dr. Richard Klausner, NCI director. "They are likely to change the standard of care for invasive cervical cancer."
For more information, go to these Web sites:
http://cancertrials.nci.nih.gov
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