BACKGROUND Pre-clinical evidence shows that fixed dose rate (FDR) infusion of gemcitabine could optimize plasma concentration of gemcitabine, while the clinical efficacy and toxicity of FDR infusion of gemcitabine in advanced pancreatic carcinoma has not been systematically investigated. Thus, this meta-analysis was designed to ascertain this issue. METHODS Databases of EMBASE, PubMed, and Co...

OBJECTIVE Imatinib mesylate, a tyrosine kinase inhibitor, is presently the drug of choice for chronic myeloid leukemia (CML). During therapy, a few patients may develop hematological and non-hematological adverse effects. MATERIALS AND METHODS The aim of this study was to evaluate the safety of imatinib therapy in patients with CML. Between December 2007 and October 2009 two hundred patients ...

PURPOSE In this Phase I, dose-seeking study, we investigated the dose-limiting toxicities (DLTs) and maximal tolerated dose (MTD) of oral topotecan in patients with hematological malignancies. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN Patients with myelodysplastic syndromes, myeloproliferative disorders, or relapsed acute myelogenous leukemia were treated with 0.6-1.9 mg/m(2)/day oral topotecan for 5 consecutive d...

PURPOSE To evaluate the safety, pharmacokinetics, and biological activity of suberoylanilide hydroxamic acid (SAHA) administered by 2-h i.v. infusion in patients with advanced cancer. EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN SAHA was administered for 3 days every 21 days in part A and 5 days for 1-3 weeks in part B. Dose escalation proceeded independently in patients with solid tumor and hematological malignancie...

AIM S-1 is a novel oral anticancer agent containing a combination of two modulators and tegafur. We conducted a phase I study of concurrent chemoradiotherapy with S-1 for head and neck cancer. PATIENTS AND METHODS S-1 was administered once daily, and radiotherapy was performed by 2 Gy/day, five days/week, for a total of 30 fractions. S-1 dosage was started at level 1 (55.3 mg/m(2)/day), and w...

PURPOSE Intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) and helical tomotherapy (HT) have been adopted for radiotherapy treatment of anal canal carcinoma (ACC) due to better conformality, dose homogeneity and normal-tissue sparing compared to 3D-CRT. To date, only one published study compares dosimetric parameters of IMRT vs HT in ACC, but there are no published data comparing toxicities. Our objective...

BACKGROUND Allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (allo-HSCT) is considered the cornerstone in treatment of hematological malignancies. However, relapse of the hematological disease after allo-HSCT remains a challenge and is associated with poor long-term survival. Chimeric antigen receptor redirected T cells (CAR-T cells) can lead to disease remission in patients with relapsed/refr...

BACKGROUND The safety of front-line chemotherapies for the treatment of extensive stage small-cell lung cancer (ED-SCLC) is uncertain. We carried out a network meta-analysis to compare the toxicity of different therapies for ED-SCLC. METHODS We searched EMBASE, PubMed, CENTRAL and clinicaltrials.gov. We performed network meta-analysis on hematological (anemia, leukopenia, neutropenia, and thr...

BACKGROUND Poor survival rates in extensive-stage small-cell lung cancer (SCLC) patients prompted us to evaluate a sequential dose-dense schedule of paclitaxel followed by topotecan. PATIENTS AND METHODS Forty-three patients with previously untreated, extensive-stage SCLC received three cycles of paclitaxel 250 mg/m(2) over 3 h every 14 days followed by three cycles of topotecan 2.5 mg/m(2) f...

The objective of the current study was to investigate the treatment outcomes for the use of cyclophosphamide, adriamycin, vincristine, and prednisolone (CHOP) chemotherapy in adult patients with hemophagocytic lymphohistiocytosis (HLH). Seventeen HLH patients older than 18 yr of age were treated with CHOP chemotherapy. A response evaluation was conducted for every two cycles of chemotherapy. Wi...