A study was undertaken to see the effect of radiation therapy on delayed type hypersensitivity reactions to mumps skin test antigen in patients with Hodgkin's disease, non‐Hodgkin's lymphomas, carcinomas of the cervix, and carcinomas in which the thymus received direct irradiation. When compared to post irradiation patients with carcinoma of the cervix, the results showed a marked decrease in skin reactivity in post‐irradiation patients with Hodgkin's disease and carcinomas such as breast, esophagus, and lung in which the thymus was irradiated. Non‐Hodgkin's lymphoma patients also showed a decrease in skin reactivity, but not to the same degree as in Hodgkin's patients. It was found that of the non‐Hodgkin's lymphoma patients, only those who did not receive thymic irradiation reacted postively to the mumps antigen. The results indicate that irradiation of the thymus may play an important role in persisting anergy in post‐treatment Hodgkin's patients who are in clinical remission.

No abstract

Survival rates and visual acuity of 100 patients treated for posterior uveal malignant melanoma by cobalt-60 plaque radiotherapy were compared with 150 patients treated by enucleation for the same disease. Life-table comparisons of the entire group showed significant differences in survival rates, with plaque radiotherapy patients appearing to fare better. However, when patients with small or medium tumors were compared, only slight differences were seen, implying that criteria used to select patients for treatment may affect interpretation. The two groups were also compared using the Cox proportional hazards model, which predicts survival based on the impact of clinical variables. In this analysis, the survival rates of the plaque radiotherapy group were no worse than those of the enucleation group. The advantage of conservative therapy lies in the potential to preserve useful vision over a considerable time. Because patients were specifically selected for treatment modality and because the study size used to calibrate the Cox model was small, the results of this study must be interpreted with caution.

No abstract

No abstract