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The relationship between estrogen receptor levels and recurrence of breast cancer was examined in 302 patients with adenocarcinoma of the breast, pathologic stage (PS) I and II. All 117 patients with PS II adenocarcinoma of the breast received adjunctive chemotherapy. In this series, there was no association between the estrogen receptor level and recurrence in either the 185 patients with PS I adenocarcinoma of the breast or the 117 patients with PS II adenocarcinoma of the breast. The most important prognostic variable was the presence or absence of axillary metastases.

Eleven patients with squamous carcinoma of the head and neck who were scheduled for surgical resection or endoscopic biopsy of tumor received 15 mg/m2 of methotrexate (MTX). Samples of tumor, normal mucosa, and plasma were obtained at surgery or endoscopy, 18-24 hours after the last MTX dose. Tissue content and plasma concentration of MTX and folate were measured using sequential radioligand-binding assays. Median MTX content was 50.0 pmol/g wet weight in tumor, 19.0 in normal mucosa, and < 0.5 nM (pmol/ml) in plasma. Since dihydrofolate reductase (DHFR) content of human tumors has previously been shown to be less than 5 pmol enzyme/g wet weight, tumor MTX content exceeded expected DHFR content in all but one patient. These data support the concept that low doses of MTX saturate tumor DHFR and that, in this regard, dose escalation may have limited value.

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