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2011 SROA Press Releases
Awards Program
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Review Indicates Smoking During and After Radiation Therapy for Head and Neck Cancers Negatively Affects Outcomes
August 2, 2010 — Five-year and disease-free survival suffered in a recent review study of patients who continued to smoke during radiation therapy for squamous cell carcinoma.
A study by Allen M. Chen, M.D., and colleagues of 101 patients who were treated with radiation therapy for head and neck cancers found significantly inferior overall survival for patients who smoked during treatment versus those who quit before treatment began, 23 percent vs. 55 percent, according to the study published in the April 15, 2010, International Journal of Radiation Oncology Biology · Physics. Each active smoker was matched to a control who had quit smoking before radiation therapy began. The matching was based on tobacco history (pack-years), primary site, age, sex, Karnofsky Performance Status, disease stage, radiation dose, chemotherapy use, year of treatment and whether surgical resection was performed. Locoregional control was inferior for the current smokers, 58 percent vs. 69 percent, and for disease-free survival, 42 percent vs. 65 percent.
“These differences remained statistically significant when patients treated by postoperative or definitive radiation therapy were analyzed separately,” the authors wrote in the results. “The incidence of grade 3 or greater late complications was also significantly increased among active smokers compared with former smokers, 49 percent versus 31 percent.”
The researchers stated that further studies are planned to assess the biologic and molecular reasons that underlie these outcomes.
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