Abstract
We herein retrospectively examined 24 nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) patients treated at Kyushu University Hospital between April 2004 and March 2014. Our series included 18 males (75.0%) and 6 females (25.0%) with a mean age of 54.7 years (range : 20 to 78). The 3-year cause-specific survival rate was 82.1%. Cervical metastases on initial presentation occurred in 20 patients (83.3%). The Stage Ⅲ+Ⅳ group comprised 66.7% of all patients, thus nearly all NPC patients presented with advanced stage disease. The patients presenting with Stage Ⅳ disease also had a poorer prognosis. Distant metastasis on initial presentation occurred in 4 patients (16.7%). The presence or absence of distant metastasis at the time of the initial visit did not affect the prognosis. Therefore, we recommend that patients with distant metastases additionally receive aggressive medical treatment, in particular combination chemotherapy with S-1. In other previous reports of aggressive treatment in Japan, platinum agents were selected as combination chemotherapy, thus suggesting that S-1 is being utilized with no comparable effects.
