Med Klin
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Randomized Controlled Trial Multicenter Study Clinical Trial
[Recurrence of Hodgkin's disease after advanced primary stages. German Hodgkin's Study Group].
In a multicentre study on the treatment of Hodgkin's disease, 88 out of 297 patients with primary advanced stages IIIB/IV failed to respond to alternating COPP/ABVD chemotherapy +/- radiotherapy. They may be broken down as follows: tumour progression under current therapy (PD) 23/28, partial remission at the end of treatment (PR) 28/88, early nodal recurrence 13/88, late nodal recurrence 15/88, extranodal recurrence 7/88, unclear localisation 1/88. Thirty-six months after noting failure of treatment, 45% of all patients were still alive. ⋯ These data would not appear to be appreciably poorer than those reported in the literature for comparable patients receiving HDC/ABMT. Only a randomized comparison would be capable of showing whether HDC/ABMT is superior to high-dose conventional chemotherapy with haematopoietic growth factors. It is proposed that such a therapeutic trial should be initiated as soon as possible.