A new mesothelioma study reveals that patients treated with “trimodality therapy” tend to have better survival rates than othermesothelioma patients.
Trimodality means three methods of mesothelioma treatment combined, rather than just one or two. The three methods most commonly used to treat pleural mesothelioma are:
- surgery,
- chemotherapy, and
- radiation.
The study looked at treatment practices used by mesothelioma doctors at the University of Washington between 1980 and 2011. It was published in the August issue of the American Journal of Clinical Oncology.
University of Washington Study on Mesothelioma Treatment Reveals Radiation Therapy in Combination With Other Therapies Increases Survival Rates
Researchers studied records of 78 pleural mesothelioma patients. The patients’ average age at the time of diagnosis was 59-years-old. The average survival time from diagnosis was 13.7 months. Pleural mesothelioma is an aggressive cancer with no known cause other than exposure to asbestos.
One particular focus of the Washington study involved radiation therapy. Some of the pleural mesothelioma patients received photon radiation, while others were given neutron radiation. Both types of radiation appeared to boost patients’ survival times. But in the 48 patients who received radiation therapy, neither type had a more beneficial effect on survival than the other.
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