A Review of the Treatment of Diffuse Malignant Pleural Mesothelioma (1980)

This was a review of published reports on treating diffuse malignant pleural mesothelioma, by authors in Créteil, France. It reported no patients of its own. The authors noted that few cases and no controlled trials made any treatment hard to judge. In the studies reviewed, removing the pleura (pleurectomy) stopped fluid build-up and relieved pain but did not change survival. Removing the pleura and lung (pleuropneumonectomy) was rarely possible and did not change survival, though better patient selection might help. Its death rate is printed in the scan as 28.52, which cannot be read with certainty. Any surgery could lead to tumour spread into the chest wall. Radiotherapy, at a median dose of 4500 rads, was described as palliative. Alkylating drugs gave a 30% objective response rate. Doxorubicin appeared most promising, and combinations including it did no better than doxorubicin alone. Steroids and talc pleurodesis were described as ineffective. The authors concluded that no treatment had been shown effective and that most tumours were already diffuse at diagnosis. They called for detection programmes in high-risk groups and large cooperative controlled trials.

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From J-M's medical library

This copy comes from the Johns-Manville medical library. It was among the papers J-M kept in its medical library without an index entry.

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