Treatment outcomes in patients with supraglottic laryngeal cancer: a single centre study

Background Treatment of squamous cell carcinoma of the supraglottic larynx (SCCSL) in Denmark has changed in several ways from the year 2000 to 2014, including the introduction of IMRT radiation technique and the addition of concurrent chemotherapy (CRT), as well as systematic reduction in waiting times until treatment initiation. Aim/Objectives Our aim is to investigate the effect of the abovementioned factors on overall survival (OS) and locoregional control (LC) for SCCSL patients. Materials and methods Retrospective cohort study with data from the DAHANCA database. We used the Kaplan-Meier and Cumulative Incidence plots as well as Cox regression analysis. Results We found a statistically significant improvement of the 5-year OS of 19.3 percentage points (pp). Cox regression found LC was not improved in patients receiving CRT compared to radiotherapy (RT) alone. Conclusions and significance Introduction of CRT treatment for head and neck cancers in general is known to improve LC. We could not demonstrate this effect for SCCSL specifically, as our results were not statistically significant on this point. OS was significantly improved.