Phase III Study Comparing Concurrent Chemoradiotherapy With Weekly Docitaxel Plus Cisplatin Versus the Standard Concurrent Radiotherapy With Cisplatin in Patients With Locally Advanced Squamous Cell Carcinoma of the Head and Neck

Head and neck cancer is the eighth most common cancer in the United States . For locally advanced HNSCC, concurrent chemoradiotherapy (chemo-RT) is the standard treatment established with multiple randomized trials . The survival benefit of chemo-RT in locally advanced HNSCC has been confirmed by meta-analyses, which revealed a 19% reduction in mortality and an absolute survival benefit of 8% at 5years when chemotherapy was administered concurrently with radiation Despite incremental improvements in local regional control and survival in HNSCC patients treated with chemo-RT, a substantial fraction of patients suffer persistent or recurrent diseases. Combining novel agents with radiation therapy therefore remains of great interest to further improving the treatment outcomes of HNSCC .

Cisplatin is the most commonly used chemotherapeutic agent given concurrently with radiation. However, introduction of additional effective radiosensitizing agents is urgently needed. A significant percentage of patients appropriate for definitive concurrent chemo-RT are not candidates for cisplatin based treatment.

Furthermore, recent data have emerged that cisplatin might not be the most optimal cytotoxic radiosensitizing agent when addition of novel targeted agents to concurrent chemo-RT is evaluated.

Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG) 0234 is a phase II randomized clinical trial evaluating postoperative radiation plus concurrent docetaxel and cetuximab versus postoperative radiation plus cisplatin and cetuximab for high-risk HNSCC after surgery. The results showed an impressive improvement in overall survival and disease-free survival of the docetaxel arm compared to the cisplatin arm (79% versus 69% and 66% versus 57% respectively . These results are pointing to the possibility that a non-cisplatin based regimen chemo-RT should be explored for further development of novel targeted agents and led to a recently opened phase III randomized RTOG trial, RTOG 1216, which compares postoperative radiation with concurrent cisplatin versus docetaxel versus docetaxel and cetuximab for high-risk HNSCC patients . docetaxel appears to have active antitumor activity in advanced SCCHN . In preclinical studies, docetaxel leads to tumor cell reoxygenation and mitotic arrest with potent radiosensitization.