Prophylactic Irradiation of the Para-Aortic Lymph Nodes in Locally Advanced Uterine Cervical Cancer

This study is an open-label, multi-institutional, randomized phase II study, which is designed to investigate the efficacy of Extended-field irradiation (EFI) on reducing recurrences at the para-aortic lymph node (PAN), and also on improving disease-free survival of locally advanced uterine cervical cancer. Radiotherapy is given as a conformal technique based on the individually taken CT scan and cisplatin is given concomitantly with radiotherapy in both EFI arm and pelvis only treatment arm. According to our past study result, patients with more hypoxic tumors are more likely to develop distant metastasis including the recurrences at PAN (1-3). This study started with examination of CA9 (hypoxia marker) expression in the primary cervical tumor before randomization because it was expected that there would be a differential benefit of EFI in patients with CA9-positive vs CA9-negative tumors. However, the study design was modified because there was too much delay in the patient with CA9-negative tumors. The patients are now registered and then immediately randomized to experimental (EFI) and control arm (pelvis only treated) with examination of CA9 expression at later time.