The CancerWeb Report, What's New In Cancer: June, 1996
Pancreatic Cancer

• A continuous-infusion treatment - Cancer of the pancreas responds poorly to treatment. It is almost invariably diagnosed when relatively advanced, due to its failure to cause early symptoms, and conventional treatment offers a five-year survival rate of less than one percent, and a median survival of only 2.8 months. With this background, earlier diagnosis and more effective treatment are sorely needed. A report from St. George's Hospital Medical School in London, in the May, 1996 issue of the British Journal of Cancer, described their use of a treatment regimen (called ECF) of continuous 5-fluorouracil infusions with three weekly cisplatin and epirubicin, that has been successfully used for breast and stomach cancers. Of 29 patients evaluable for response, five (17.3%) showed partial responses, 18 (62%) had stable disease, and six (20.7%) progressed. Overall median survival was 253 days for those with stable or responsive disease compared with 170 days for those whose disease progressed. Although there was longer survival with ECF treatment, toxicity was severe, and included hair loss, vomiting, nausea, stomatitis, diarrhea, suppression of blood white cell counts, and infections (one death as a result). (Evans, Br J Cancer 73:1260, 1996)