Three dimensional-conformal radiotherapy combined with capecitabine for patients with esophageal cancer

Objective To evaluate the therapeutic effection,toxicity of concurrent chemotherapy(capecitabine) and three dimensional-conformal radiotherapy(3D-CRT) for patients with advanced esophageal cancer.Methods 71 patients with esophageal cancer were randomly divided into two groups: 35 cases received 3DCRT alone.Radiation therapy using 6MV-X-ray,three-dimensional conformal radiotherapy method for total dose radiation to 60-70 Gy/6 to 7 weeks,conventional segmentation 2 Gy,5 times per week.36 cases received 3D-CRT combined with capecitabine,Capecitabine was given in first day of radiotherapy,1 000 mg/m2,for 2 weeks,rest 1 week,21 days a cycle,taking two cycles.Results The overall response(CR+PR) rates for the radiotherapy combined with Capecitabine group and the radiotherapy alone group were 88.9%,68.6%(P0.05) respectively.The acute toxicities reaction was severer in radiotherapy combined with chemotherapy group but they were accepted.Conclusion Three dimensional-conformal radiotherapy combined with Capecitabine for patients with advanced esophageal cancer could significantly improve the local control rate and had slight side effect.