Refractory Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma Clinical Trial
Official title:
Phase II Study of Ifosfamide and Doxorubicin in Patients With Refractory Nasopharyngeal Carcinoma
This research is to test the effectiveness and toxicity of both Ifosfamide and Doxorubicin. It also aims to explore the relationship between EBV DNA and clinical response in patients with advanced naso-pharyngeal cancer which has been previously treated with chemotherapy.
Nasopharyngeal Cancer (NPC) is one of the common cancer in Southeast Asia. In this region NPC
is associated with Epstein Barr Virus (EBV) chronic infection with EBV DNA identifiable in
almost all the NPC tumors and patient's serum at the time of diagnosis. Chinese, especially
cantonese has the highest incidence. Only about 30% of patients presents early disease and
has a good treatment outcome (80% cure for stage I disease and 70% for stage II by
radiation).
This research is to test the effectiveness and toxicity of both Ifosfamide and Doxorubicin.
It also aims to explore the relationship between EBV DNA and clinical response in patients
with advanced naso-pharyngeal cancer which has been previously treated with chemotherapy.
Investigators believe EBV infection is necessary to cause NPC and that EBV DNA levels in the
blood may directly relate to the total size of the tumor. Because NPC patients in this
situation have a poor outlook, we design this study to evaluate the combination of Ifosfamide
and doxorubicin for further treatment. While this combination of medicines has been used in
many other forms of cancer, it has not been tested in patients with NPC.
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