Hyperthermia/Chemotherapy Combination Doubles Survival in Sarcoma Patients

Several phase III clinical studies have shown significantly better results in treating certain cancers when hyperthermia therapy was added to radiation therapy, as compared to radiation treatments alone. At this year's ASCO conference, the results of a 340-patient randomized phase III clinical trial testing the benefit of adding hyperthermia therapy to chemotherapy were reported (abstract 10009).

"This is the first randomized phase III clinical trial ever conducted on the use of regional hyperthermia therapy in combination with standard chemotherapy," said Rolf D. Issels, MD, PhD, who presented the results. "It showed an approximate doubling of disease-free survival and local progression-free survival for high-risk soft-tissue sarcoma patients when hyperthermia therapy was added to chemotherapy, as compared to the results for patients treated with chemotherapy alone."

All hyperthermia treatments performed in the study were conducted using BSD-2000 hyperthermia systems developed and produced by BSD Medical Corp. The use of precision-focused hyperthermia therapy during chemotherapy treatments opens cancer cells to better absorption of chemotherapy drugs by improving blood flow as well as by other biologic mechanisms of action. Hyperthermia therapy also kills cancer cells directly and can be used to improve chemical reactions of some chemotherapy drugs.