Combinatorial strategies of radiotherapy in the management of nasopharyngeal carcinoma.

Combinatorial strategies of radiotherapy in the management of nasopharyngeal carcinoma. Br J Radiol. 2019 Jul 02;:20190209 Authors: Sun XS, Li XY, Chen QY, Tang LQ, Mai HQ Abstract Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is a malignancy with unique clinical biological profiles such as associated Epstein-Barr virus infection and high radiosensitivity. Radiotherapy has long been recognized as the mainstay for the treatment of NPC. However, the further efficacy brought by radical radiotherapy has reached the bottleneck in advanced patients, who are prone to develop recurrence and distant metastasis after treatment. The application of photon therapy makes it possible for radiation dose escalation in refractory cases and may provide second chance for recurrent patients with less unrecoverable tissue damage. The concept of adaptive radiotherapy is put forward in consideration of target volume shrinkage during treatment. The replanning procedure offers better protection for the organ at risk. However, the best timing and candidates for adaptive radiotherapy is still under debate. The current tendency of artificial intelligence (AI) in NPC mainly focuses on image recognition, auto-segmentation and dose prediction. Although AI is still in developmental stage, the future of it is promising. To further improve the efficacy of NPC, multimodality treatment is encouraged. In-depth studies on genetic and epigenetic variations help to explain the great heter...
Source: The British Journal of Radiology - Category: Radiology Authors: Tags: Br J Radiol Source Type: research