Short Course Palliative Radiotherapy For locally Advanced Head and Neck Cancer

A proportion of advanced stage head and neck cancer patients are incurable and have a limited life expectancy of 100 days or less. The study aimed to offer a short course of palliative radiotherapy (PRT) , evaluate the symptom relief and disease response.Patients and methods: Between May 2009 and Nov 2010,20 patients of stage IV squamous cell carcinoma received uniform dose of 20 Gy in 5 fractions over 1 week. Distressing symptoms were assessed before PRT.Results: Good symptom relief (50% or more) was found in 50% for pain, 50% for dysphagia, 60% for hoarseness, 80% for insomnia, 60 % for respiratory distress and 50% for cough.The overall PR rate was35%,none of the patients died due to radiation toxicity, and the radiation morbidities were confined to patchy mucositis, which healed over 1 month.,Conclusions: Unfavourable advanced stage head and neck cancer can be identified for a suitable short course of palliative radiotherapy which will achieve symptom relief in sizeable proportions for an approximate period of 7.