PROPHYLACTIC AND THERAPEUTIC MANAGEMENT OF ACUTE RADIATION RELATED MORBIDITY OF THE SKIN AND MUCOSA - PART I - RESULTS OF A GERMAN MULTICENTER QUESTIONNAIRE

Background: The acute radiation related morbidity is an essential fact or for the patient's outcome in radiotherapy. The prophylactic and the rapeutic management of acute side effects has a wide clinical range be tween different radiation oncology departments. In this work, it was t o evaluate the remedies, which are used for prevention and therapeutic management of acute radiation related morbidity of the skin and mucos a (mouth, pharynx, esophagus, small and large bowel, rectum and vagina ). Methods: A questionnaire was sent to 130 radiotherapeutic departmen ts in Germany in July 1995. The questionnaire had been designed with 2 2 open questions concerning the preventive and therapeutic management of acute radiation related morbidity of skin and mucosal sites. It has been correlated to the scoring system of the RTOG/ EORTC and its Germ an modification according to Seegenschmiedt and Sauer. The evaluation was performed anonymously. Results: From 130 questionnaires, 89 (68.4% ) were sent back till August 1995. All of them were evaluable. The rec ommendations showed a broad spectrum for each site. Especially the ora l mucositis was treated in many different ways and combinations. The p revention and therapy of complicating superinfections seem to be the j oint principle of most of the recommendations. Conclusions: The manage ment of the acute radiation related morbidity has a wide clinical spec trum among different radiation therapy centers. Systematic prospective ly designed investigations are necessary in order to achieve a further reduction in the radiation related acute morbidity. Therefore, a mult icenter collaborative working group has been founded.