VP.  Cartei G.  Fiorentino MV. Chemotherapy of invasive or

metastatic thymoma: report of 11 cases. Cancer Treatment

Reports.  68(10):1205-10, 1984 Oct.

Abstract…

Eleven patients with invasive thymoma (seven males and four

females) were seen from 1977 to 1983. All patients were adults

with a median age of 46 years (range, 24-62), and presented

after surgical exploration with nonremovable primary and with

one or more of the following patterns of tumor extension:

supraclavicular lymphadenopathy (four patients), superior vena

cava syndrome (two), pleural effusion (nine), and pericardial

effusion (three). The following distant metastases were also

observed: lung (six patients), liver (one), skin (two),

peritoneum (two), bone (one), and brain (one). The

chemotherapy was administered in 4-day courses. All patients

received the following: 50 mg/m2 of cisplatin iv and 40 mg/m2

of doxorubicin iv on Day 1, 0.6 mg/m2 of vincristine iv on Day

3, and 700 mg/m2 of cyclophosphamide iv on Day 4. The course

was repeated every 3 weeks. Toxic effects were tolerable, as

expected for the drug combination adopted. Four of 11 patients

achieved objective complete regression of disease and six of

11 had partial remission, for an overall response rate of 91%;

one patient had stable disease for 7 months. Six patients have

died and the median survival has been 12.5 months, ranging

from 5 to 23 months.

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