Abstract
The present paper reports a retrospective analysis of 16 patients with distant metastases from squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck observed in our Institute in the last 10 years. Nine patients out of 16 underwent chemotherapy (7 patients), chemotherapy and radiotherapy (1 patient), or an alternating chemo-radiotherapy regimen (1 patient). The remaining 7 patients were not considered for a palliative treatment because of a poor performance status. Two complete responses, 2 partial responses, 2 stable diseases and 3 progressions were observed, with an overall response rate of 44 %. Chemotherapy, when administrable, showed a temporary effectiveness, at least in patients with lung metastases. The combination of cisplatin and 5-fluorouracil seems to maintain the efficacy already shown in patients with locally relapsed disease.
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