Preliminary clinical observation of concurrent radiochemotherapy for 31 patients with stage II nasal cavity natural killer/T cell lymphoma

Objective To observe the primary clinical effect of concurrent radiochemotherapy for patients with nasal cavity natural killer (NK)/T cell lymphoma and to analyze the prognostic factors. Methods 31 primary untreated patients with stage Ⅱ nasal cavity NK/T cell lymphoma were enrolled for this study. All patients underwent concurrent radiochemotherapy with intensity-modulated radiotherapy technique + asparaginase based chemotherapeutic agents and adjuvant chemotherapy. Results The main toxicities were mouth mucocitis, myelosuppression and xerosmia at grade 1 or 2. 31 patients achieved good clinical short-term effect with high local complete remission rate at the 3rd month after radiotherapy [83.9 % (26/31)], and the 2-year overall survival rate was 77 %. Univariate and multivariate analysis suggested IPI score and clinical short-term effect were the significant independent survival prognostic factors (P < 0.05). Conclusions Concurrent radiochemotherapy for stage Ⅱ nasal cavity NK/T cell lymphoma can be well tolerated by patients with mild toxicities, and can improve both clinical short-term effect and overall survival by high local complete remission rate. IPI score and clinical short-term effect are the important survival prognostic factors. Key words: Lymphoma, extranodal NK-T-cell; Concurrent radiochemotherapy; Radiotherapy, intensity-modulated; Drug toxicity; Prognosis