View clinical trials related to Head and Neck Neoplasms.
Filter by:Wound complications, such as salivary-cutaneous fistulas and skin necrosis, result in significant patient morbidity and death. Head and neck wounds are complicated because of multiple tissue layers, critical structures and variable vascularity. When vascularity is compromised, wounds do not heal and can lead to life threatening haemorrhage or morbid infections. The field of microsurgical reconstruction has developed and expanded over the last 20 years to specifically ameliorate these issues. The challenge is that the vascularity of the microsurgical transplant or the recipient tissue bed can have areas of decreased vascularity that cannot be appreciated by the surgeon's intraoperative exam alone. Surgeons would be able to make better decisions with respect to the vascularity if there was an imaging technique that could indicate the vascular supply of the tissues undergoing surgical reconstruction. Laser-assisted indocyanine green fluorescent dye angiography (LA-ICG) using the SPY System (Novadaq Technologies Inc., Richmond, British Columbia, Canada) is an intraoperative vascular imaging technique that improves the ability of a surgeon to assess the vascular supply in the surgical bed. This tool, which is approved by Health Canada for reconstructive surgery, has been used extensively in breast reconstruction and gastrointestinal procedures with encouraging results. The ability to address ischemic tissues intraoperatively could potentially decrease the rate of devastating wound complications in head and neck surgery patients. The objective of this observational study is to assess the effectiveness of LA-ICG in head and neck reconstructive procedures to reduce the rate of skin necrosis and fistula.
Head and neck cancer surgery presents the challenge of tumour resection in close proximity to critical structures such as the carotid arteries and optic nerves. The need for precise localization within complex 3D anatomy has motivated the development of image-guidance systems that account for tissue deformation and excision through the use of intraoperative cone-beam CT (CBCT). A prototype mobile C-arm for intraoperative flat-panel CBCT has been developed at UHN in collaboration with Siemens Healthcare to provide low-dose 3D images with sub-mm spatial resolution and soft-tissue visibility. Extensive investigation in pre-clinical/clinical H&N, otology, orthopaedic, lung, and spine surgery has demonstrated the benefit of intraoperative CBCT for improved target ablation, localization accuracy, and critical structure avoidance. Prospective clinical trial in CBCT-guided H&N surgery will be conducted to evaluate the Zeego robotic platform for CBCT. Patient accrual will span a wide range of surgical procedures in otolaryngology, including cancer resection and anatomical reconstruction in the mandible, maxilla, sinuses, skull base, and temporal bone. The effect of intraoperative imaging and surgical guidance on logistical considerations of time, workflow, and compatibility with the OR environment will be evaluated through the use of in-room audio/video recordings, human factors engineering methods, and expert feedback questionnaires obtained from the surgeons, nurses, and anesthetists involved in each case. This clinical investigation will help to further define indications for CBCT-guided H&N surgery, and serve to enable the development of surgical task-specific imaging protocols.
An estimated 1500 people in Sweden will annually be diagnosed with head and neck cancer (HNC). Five year survival is approximately 69%. Long-term sequelae are common and in particular nutritional problems and fatigue. Radiotherapy (RT) is the cornerstone of treatment, either as single modality treatment or combined modality treatment. RT can induce immune responses at the site of tumor. It has been demonstrated that RT can lead to a strong systemic immune response . We have previously shown that an increase of conventional measures of systemic immune response to RT varied significantly across individuals. We predict that local immune response plays a major role in the antitumor effect. We also predict that a strong systemic immune response contributes to malnutrition and influence on survival. And malnutrition may lead to a worse response to RT. The overall aim of this multicenter observational longitudinal study is to prospectively identify immunological and metabolic variables that affect the outcome of HNC patients. We will systematically investigate the local and systemic immune response induced by RT as well as explore alterations in metabolite composition induced by disease and treatment through global metabolite profiling. A platform for studies on immuno-metabolic changes in HNC patients has been established in the Uppsala-Orebro and Northern regions. Approximately 370 patients per year are eligible. Findings in this study can have implications on the development of personalized therapy in patients with HNC. The long-term benefit of the study will be the identification of measures for improved patient surveillance in order to improve the general and nutritional outcomes.
Purpose: Rationale: Acupuncture is a therapy for physical activity disorders secondary to nervous diseases, and it may have therapeutic effects on dysphagia caused by radiation therapy. Purpose: This randomized trial aims to investigate whether acupuncture may alleviate radiation-induced dysphagia in patients with head and neck cancer. The effect was compared with outcomes in patients without receiving acupuncture.
The study will evaluate the feasibility and potential effectiveness of the Flexitouch head and neck treatment plus standard home care compared to standard home care regimen alone.
The purpose of the study is to investigate the clinical usefulness of serum levels of immunologic profiles including pro/anti-inflammatory interleukins, other detectable serum biomarkers including transforming growth factor b1 (TGFb1) or soluble major histocompatibility complex Class I chain-related peptide A (sMICA), and leukocyte subpopulations in head and neck cancers patients receiving curative radiotherapy, as prognostic biomarkers for disease recurrence and survival.
It has been well established that malignant tumors tend to have low levels of oxygen and that tumors with very low levels of oxygen are more resistant to radiotherapy and other treatments, such as chemotherapy and immunotherapy. Previous attempts to improve response to therapy by increasing the oxygen level of tissues have had disappointing results and collectively have not led to changing clinical practice. Without a method to measure oxygen levels in tumors or the ability to monitor over time whether tumors are responding to methods to increase oxygen during therapy, clinician's reluctance to use oxygen therapy in usual practice is not surprising. The hypothesis underlying this research is that repeated measurements of tissue oxygen levels can be used to optimize cancer therapy, including combined therapy, and to minimize normal tissue side effects or complications. Because studies have found that tumors vary both in their initial levels of oxygen and exhibit changing patterns during growth and treatment, we propose to monitor oxygen levels in tumors and their responsiveness to hyperoxygenation procedures. Such knowledge about oxygen levels in tumor tissues and their responsiveness to hyper-oxygenation could potentially be used to select subjects for particular types of treatment, or otherwise to adjust routine care for patients known to have hypoxic but unresponsive tumors in order to improve their outcomes. The overall objectives of this study are to establish the clinical feasibility and efficacy of using in vivo electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) oximetry—a technique related to magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)—to obtain direct and repeated measurements of clinically useful information about tumor tissue oxygenation in specific groups of subjects with the same types of tumors, and to establish the clinical feasibility and efficacy of using inhalation of enriched oxygen to gain additional clinically useful information about responsiveness of tumors to hyper-oxygenation. Two devices are used: a paramagnetic charcoal suspension (Carlo Erba India ink) and in vivo EPR oximetry to assess oxygen levels. The ink is injected and becomes permanent in the tissue at the site of injection unless removed; thereafter, the in vivo oximetry measurements are noninvasive and can be repeated indefinitely.
To confirm the feasibility of studying Xtampza ER during radiotherapy (RT) for LAHNC as part of a prospective clinical trial.
Each subject will participate in the trial until death, drop out, or loss-to follow-up from the time the subject signs the Informed Consent Form (ICF) through the final contact. After a screening phase of up to 28 days, each eligible subject will receive nivolumab. Two weeks after start of nivolumab the patients will receive radiotherapy (RT) to a total dose of 60 Gy, given as 1.5 Gy fractions twice daily for a total period of 4 weeks. Treatment with nivolumab will continue until disease progression, unacceptable adverse event(s), intercurrent illness that prevents further administration of treatment, Investigator's decision to withdraw the subject, noncompliance with trial treatment or procedures requirements, subject receives nivolumab for 12 months, pregnancy, or administrative reasons. After the end of treatment, each subject will be followed for 30 days for adverse event monitoring serious adverse events (SAEs) will be collected for 90 days after the end of treatment. Patients without disease progression will have follow-up visits for 4 years after end of study therapy.
This study evaluates the possible benefits of a tasteless and sugar free chewing gum as a salivary stimulant for head and neck cancer patients treated with curative intended radiotherapy.