The role of chemotherapy and latest emerging target therapies in anaplastic thyroid cancer.

ABSTRACT: Anaplastic thyroid cancer represents 1%-2% of thyroid cancers. For its aggressiveness, it is considered a systemic disease at the time of diagnosis. Surgery remains the cornerstone of therapy in resectable tumor. Traditional chemotherapy has little effect on metastatic disease. A multimodality approach, incorporating cytoreductive surgical resection, chemoradiation, either concurrently or sequentially, and new promising target therapies is advisable. Doxorubicin is the most commonly used agent, with a response rate of 22%. Recently, other chemotherapy agents have been used, such as paclitaxel and gemcitabine, with superimposable activity and response rates of 10%-20%. However, survival of patients with anaplastic thyroid cancer has changed little in the past 50 years, despite more aggressi

SUBMITTER: Denaro N 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3787923 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature