Concomitant chemoradiotherapy: rationale and clinical experience in patients with solid tumors.

Concomitant chemoradiotherapy can be used in order to increase both the local and systemic control of solid tumors. The rationale for its use and experimental data for selected chemotherapy drugs are reviewed. Clinical trials have focused on increasing complete response (CR) and survival rates; in addition, improved quality of life by decreasing the use of conventional surgical procedures is being pursued. Both of these goals may have been achieved for some tumors, most notably for anal cell carcinoma. Improved survival with concomitant chemoradiotherapy has also been shown for patients treated on randomized studies for pancreatic, colorectal, small-cell lung, head and neck, and cervical cancer. These results call for the continued investigation of this approach in the laboratory and in the clinic.