It is likely that radiosensitive patients have less efficient mechanisms of elimination of apoptotic cells with DNA damage resulting in accumulation of LAN cells and facilitating adverse reactions. Our data suggested that the grade of adverse reaction may positively correlate with LAN cells in PBL before and during radiotherapy.

PurposePrimary malignant melanoma of the nasal cavity and nasopharynx is rarely seen. Clinically, most patients display initial nonspecific symptoms of unilateral nasal obstruction or epistaxis. The prognosis is generally poor, with a mean survival time of 3.5 years.Material and methodsIn this paper, we have reported the case of malignant melanoma of the nasal cavity and nasopharynx. 79 years old man had presented with the swelling of the nose, nasal blockage and epistaxis during the six months before diagnosis. Functional endoscopic sinus surgery was performed to excised the nasal cavity tumor. Using positron emission tomography/computed tomography examination with 18-fluorodeoxyglucose, the patient was diagnosed with residual nasopharyngeal tumor after surgery.ResultsFollowing the diagnosis, intracavitary brachytherapy for nasopharynx was administered. Solitary cervical nodal involvement occurred 6 months after the diagnosis when had been completely removed. After that, external beam radiotherapy was performed on the submandibular area on the right side. Thereafter, the patient was given follow-up care in the Department of Radiation Oncology until the time of distant progression of the disease.ConclusionsWe have chosen to discuss this condition, because of its rarity and the possibility of using radiotherapy, even though the malignant melanoma had been regarded as a radioresistant disease, and also to emphasize the importance of a multidisciplinary approach to treatment of such patients.

DNA double strand breaks (DSB) induced by ionizing radiation (IR) are usually measured using γH2AX/53BP1 DNA repair foci, that is considered to be the most sensitive assay for DSB analysis. While fluorescence microscopy (FM) is the gold standard for this analysis, imaging flow cytometry (IFC) may offer number of advantages such as lack of the fluorescence background, higher number of cells analyzed, and higher sensitivity in detection of DNA damage induced by IR at low doses. Along with appearance of γH2AX foci, the variable fraction of the cells exhibits homogeneously stained γH2AX signal resulting in so-called γH2AX pan-staining, which is believed to appear at early stages of apoptosis. Here, we investigated incidence of γH2AX pan-staining at different time points after irradiation with γ-rays using IFC and compared the obtained data with the data from FM. Appearance of γH2AX pan-staining during the apoptotic process was further analyzed by fluorescence-activated cell sorting (FACS) of cells at different

Background: Soft-tissue sarcomas are rare tumors with the incidence of multiple metachronous or synchronous lesions in the extremities being even more uncommon. In eff ort to preserve the function of upper extremities, limb-salvage surgery became the treatment of choice for soft-tis sue sarcomas. Subsequent adjuvant chemotherapy, as well as radiotherapy, is believed to decrease local recurrence rates, however, their eff ect on overall survival remains unclear. Case: We report herein a case of symmetrical bilateral metachronous malignant fi brous histiocytomas of the shoulder. A 19-year-old patient presented with stiff ness and pain in the right shoulder. The same symptoms developed 1.5 years later in the other shoulder. The culprit tumors are reported metachronous with regard to the succession in the onset of symptoms. Wide tumor resection was performed in both shoulders, and postoperative radiotherapy was then conducted. Chemotherapy was not indicated after the fi rst surgery; whereas, in the second case it was the patient who refused the recommended adjuvant chemotherapy. Conclusion: The phenomenon of either metachronous or synchronous incidence of multiple soft tissue sarcomas is very rare and systematic reporting of every new case in the literature could contribute to further knowledge of tumor's unique behavior.

OBJECTIVES: To analyse whether the maximum standardized uptake value of the positron emission tomography/computed tomography for radiotherapy planning was useful as a prognostic factor for tumour response and survival of patients with locally advanced non-small cell lung cancer. BACKGROUND: Increased 18F-fl uoro-2-deoxyglucose uptake by lung cancer cells, measured as the maximum standardized uptake value, has been reported to predict the biologic aggressiveness of both early and advanced non-small cell lung cancer. METHODS: A prospective study was performed in 61 consecutive patients with unresectable stage IA-IIIB of non-small cell lung cancer. The mean age was 65 years. Seventy fi ve percent of patients in the entire group received an induction chemotherapy. The mean dose of radiotherapy was 61Gy. All patients underwent 18F-fl uoro-2-deoxy-D-glucose positron emission tomography/computed tomography for radiotherapy planning. RESULTS: Thirty six percent of the patients experienced a complete response and 20 % had a partial tumour response. Forty four percent of the patients suffered from a progressive disease. The maximum standardized uptake value of the primary tumour more than 11.4 was correlated with a worse tumour response (p = 0.0001) and a shorter survival of our patients (p = 0.0109). CONCLUSION: We found a correlation between the maximum standardized uptake value and the patient prognosis and lung cancer aggressiveness (Tab. 3, Fig. 5, Ref. 18). Text in PDF www.elis.sk.