Chimiothérapie d'induction des cancers des voies aéro-digestives supérieures. Analyse de la réponse tumorale chez 176 malades.

: Tumoral responses to 3 courses of induction chemotherapy were investigated in 176 patients with squamous cell carcinomas of the head and neck previously untreated. The number of responses increased with the number of courses. Thus, out of 79 patients with a more than 50% response after the 3 courses, almost one third had no response after the first course, and 98.8% had a less than 50% response after the second course. In consequence, it may be stated that a 3rd and perhaps a 4th course is justified in patients who responded after 2 courses. There seems to be a poor correlation in responders between clinical and histological results: 68.5% of patients with complete response still had a tumour on the excised tissue. No correlation was found between the influence of T in the TNM clinical classification and that of squamous cell differentiation on the one hand and the macroscopic character of the tumour during response on the other hand.