Anticancer research
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Anticancer research · Jul 2003
Clinical TrialSafety of cisplatin after severe hypersensitivity reactions to carboplatin in patients with recurrent ovarian carcinoma.
Carboplatin is a milestone drug against ovarian carcinoma; it is used both in front-line and second-line chemotherapy. Hypersensitivity reactions to carboplatin may occur during the treatment as salvage therapy. The purpose of this study was to describe the feasibility of the replacing of carboplatin with cisplatin in patients presenting with severe hypersensitivity reactions to carboplatin. ⋯ To date, platinum-based regimens remain the most effective treatment in recurrent platinum-sensitive ovarian cancer with a high rate of objective responses. Although our experience is limited, we suggest that, under anesthesiologic surveillance and providing immunologic blockade, the replacement of carboplatin salvage therapy with cisplatin can be considered a safe therapeutic strategy in patients who cannot continue carboplatin due to allergic reactions.
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Anticancer research · Jul 2003
Clinical TrialUsefulness of technetium-99m hexamethylpropylene amine oxime lung scan to detect sub-clinical lung injury of patients with breast cancer after chemotherapy.
We investigated the sub-clinical lung injury in patients with breast cancer after chemotherapy by technetium-99m hexamethylpropylene amine oxime (Tc-99m HMPAO) lung scan. Fifty patients who underwent surgical resection for breast cancers were divided into two groups, those who received a combination of adjuvant chemotherapy and those who did not. Group 1 consisted of 25 patients who received adjuvant chemotherapy and group 2 consisted of 25 patients who did not receive adjuvant chemotherapy. ⋯ None of the 50 patients had positive plain chest radiograph (CXR) and pulmonary function test (PFT) findings. The results showed a significantly higher L/L ratio in the group 1 patients (0.57 +/- 0.13) than in the group 2 patients (0.32 +/- 0.05). We conclude that chemotherapeutic drugs may result in pulmonary vascular endothelium damage and that Tc-99m HMPAO lung scan has the potential to be a sensitive, objective and non-invasive method to detect sub-clinical lung injury of patients with breast cancers after chemotherapy.