Publication details
Radiotherapy with rituximab may be better than radiotherapy alone in first-line treatment of earlystage follicular lymphoma: is it time to change the standard strategy?
| Title in English | Radiotherapy with rituximab may be better than radiotherapy alone in first-line treatment of early-stage follicular lymphoma: Is it time to change the standard strategy? |
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| Authors | |
| Year of publication | 2015 |
| Type | Article in Periodical |
| Magazine / Source | Leukemia & Lymphoma |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Doi | http://dx.doi.org/10.3109/10428194.2014.990010 |
| Field | Oncology and hematology |
| Keywords | Follicular lymphoma; rituximab; radiotherapy |
| Description | Early-stage follicular lymphoma (FL) has traditionally been treated with involved-fi eld radiotherapy (RT). Rituximab (R) is a low-toxic, effi cient systemic therapy for FL, but there are no data about its clinical impact in early FL. We retrospectively analyzed 93 patients with stage I – II indolent FL treated with RT (n=65) or RT + R (n=14) or R alone (n=14). Median follow-up was 5.0 years for patients with RT, 2.8 years for the RT + R subgroup and 2.5 years for patients treated with R. The complete response rate was 92%, 100% and 86% (not signifi cant) and the median PFS was 3.3 years, not reached and 4.9 years (p=0.035) for the RT, RT + R and R arms, with no impact on overall survival. R combined with RT seems to give better results in terms of global FL control, but longer follow-up and prospective comparison are needed to verify these results. |