Pretreatment apoptotic scores do not predict response to radiation therapyin oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma

The prognostic value of tumor apoptosis was studied in patients with oropha ryngeal squamous cell carcinoma treated with radical radiotherapy. Forty-ei ght patients with oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma who received radica l radiotherapy between 1990 and 1995 were enrolled in the study. The radiat ion treatment for all patients involved the administration of 65 Gy in 26 f ractions over a 6.5-week period. The apoptotic index (AI; the apoptotic cel l count per 1000 tumor cells) was distributed from 0 to 10 with a median at 2 and a mode of 1. There was a significant linear correlation between the AI and mitotic index (MI) (r = 0.393, 95% confidence interval: 0.129-0.605) . The cause-specific 5-year survival for patients with AI greater than the median was 46% and for the counterpart was 41%. There was no difference in cause-specific survival between AI/MI greater than the median (50%) and AI/ MI smaller than the median (36%). The number of patients was too small to d raw definite conclusions, but the AI and the AI/MI before treatment were no t shown to have a prognostic value for oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinom a in our study. The primary sites and treatment methods may influence the p rognostic value of AI even for the same histological types. (C) 2001 Elsevi er Science Ltd. All rights reserved.