Enter Your Email Address to Receive a
Copy of MedicExhange Member Demograhpics

Routine Oesophageal Screening Recommended for Patients Previously Treated for Head and Neck Cancer was Presented at AAO-HNSF Annual Meeting 2009.

Patients who have been treated for head and neck cancer (HNCA) should be screened for oesophageal pathologies about 3 months out whether they are symptomatic or not, according a poster presentation here October 4 at the American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery Foundation (AAO-HNSF) Annual Meeting 2009.

Oesophageal pathology is extremely common in patients who have been treated for HNCA, according to the researchers.

"When we talk about HNCA, the 5-year survival rate for this cancer is 50%," Peter C. Belafsky, MD, Head and Neck Oncological Surgery, University of California at Davis, and the Voice and Swallowing Center, Davis, California, told DocGuide.

"We took a look at the oesophagus in patients after treatment for head and neck cancer and we did oesophagoscopy and biopsy, as indicated, on all of them. We successfully performed the oesophagoscopy on all 100 patients without complication and we had only 13% of the entire cohort who had a normal examination."

The results of the study suggest that physicians cannot simply rely on patients' symptoms, since in the study, patient symptoms were not associated with oesophageal disease. "The real big take here, is that patients who have been treated for head and neck cancer should have routine screening oesophagoscopy at least within 3 months."

Source: AAO-HNSF

You can discuss more about Cardiology and related topics in our Cardiology Group.