Adjuvant long-term immunochemotherapy for squamous cell carcinoma of the thoracic esophagus.

Between 1965 and 1978, 131 patients with primary squamous cell carcinoma of the thoracic esophagus underwent subtotal esophagectomy. Since 1972 we hae used active therapy involving pre- and postoperative irradiation and postoperative long-term cancer immunochemotherapy. When the surgical results of the active therapy and the historical control group, in which postoperative radiotherapy was used primarily, were compared, active therapy appeared to be high effective. The one, two, and three-year survival rates were 54.7, 36.3, and 27.1 per cent, respectively, in the former, and 32, 14, and 12 12 per cent, respectively, in the latter group. With respect to noncurative cases, the one-year survival rate was 42.2 per cent in the active therapy group, and 20 per cent in the control group.