[Chemotherapy and radiotherapy for non-Hodgkin's lymphomas of the nasal cavity].

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the effects of different treatments on the prognosis of patients with non-Hodgkin's lymphomas of the nasal cavity. METHODS: A retrospective study of 59 patients who suffered from stage I(E) primary non-Hodgkin's lymphomas of the nasal cavity was presented. They were treated by radiotherapy and chemotherapy of CHOP regimen, in which 33 patients received chemotherapy plus radiotherapy, 8 patients received radiotherapy plus chemotherapy, 10 patients received chemotherapy alone, and 8 patients received radiotherapy alone. Survival analysis was performed by Kaplan-Meier method, the difference between groups was evaluated by log-rank test, and the comparison of rates was carried out by chi(2) test. RESULTS: The overall 1-, 3- and 5-year survival rates were 71.2%, 42.0% and 38.5%, respectively. There was no significant difference among the patients received different treatments (chi(2) = 2.98, P = 0.3943), but the patients received radiotherapy plus chemotherapy seemed to have a better survival curve than other patients. The 1-, 3- and 5-year survival rates were 84.2%, 67.7% and 62.0% for lesion limited in nasal cavity but 50.0%, 14.3% and 14.3% for lesion extended and involved the adjacent structures (chi(2) = 10.46, P = 0.0012). As the initial therapy, 24 patients who received chemotherapy of more than 3 cycles, and 16 patients who received radiotherapy of more than 40 Gy, and the complete response (CR) rates were 25.0% and 75.0% (chi(2) = 9.697, P = 0.002). Among 43 patients received chemotherapy, the CR rates for those who received 2, 3 - 4 and 5 - 6 cycles were 10.5%, 25.0% and 25.0%, respectively (chi(2) = 1.467, P = 0.48). Patients who received chemotherapy plus radiotherapy have higher rates of both complication and treatment-related mortality, but the difference was not statistically significant (P = 0.202 and 0.693). CONCLUSION: For stage I non-Hodgkin's lymphomas of the nasal cavity, radiotherapy should be the first treatment to get early local control. Chemotherapy may be followed at the discretion of the pathological grade and clinical staging, or IPI.