Adjuvant Ozonetherapy in Advanced Head and Neck Tumors: A Comparative Study

Abstract

Advanced head and neck (H&N) tumors have a poor prognosis, and this is worsened by the occurrence of hypoxia and ischemia in the tumors. Ozonetherapy has proved useful in the treatment of ischemic syndromes, and several studies have described a potential increase of oxygenation in tissues and tumors. The aim of this prospective study was to evaluate the clinical effect of ozonetherapy in patients with advanced H&N cancer in the course of their scheduled radiotherapy. Over a period of 3 years, 19 patients with advanced H&N tumors who were undergoing treatment in our department with non-standard fractionated radiotherapy plus oral tegafur. A group of 12 patients was additionally treated with intravenous chemotherapy before and/or during radiotherapy. In the other group of seven patients, systemic ozonetherapy was administered twice weekly during radiotherapy. The ozonetherapy group was older (64 versus 54 years old, P = 0.006), with a higher percentage of lymph node involvement (71% versus 8%, P = 0.019) and with a trend to more unfavorable tumor stage (57% versus 8% IVb + IVc stages, P = 0.073). However, there was no significant difference in overall survival between the chemotherapy (median 6 months) and ozonetherapy (8 months) groups. Although these results have to be viewed with caution because of the limited number of patients, they suggest that ozonetherapy could have had some positive effect during the treatment of our patients with advanced H&N tumors. The adjuvant administration of ozonetherapy during the chemo–radiotherapy for these tumors merits further research.

Protective effects of medical ozone combined with traditional Chinese medicine against chemically-induced hepatic injury in dogs

“…It has been used in an empirical fashion in recent years for therapy of viral hepatitis. Rectal insufflation with ozone can reduce hepatic and renal ischemia-reperfusion injury [10][11][12][13][14][15] . Yigan Fuzheng Paidu Capsules (YC), an empirical formula, is a compound preparation of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) for treating chronic viral hepatitis.…”

Ozone Therapy as Adjuvant for Cancer Treatment: Is Further Research Warranted?

“…We evaluated 2 groups: one with neoadjuvant CT (before commencing RT and concurrent 5-fluorouracil) and the other group without neoadjuvant CT but with O 3 T (by autohemotherapy method) during concurrent RT and 5-fluorouracil. Both patient groups had the same median survival (8 months) despite the fact that the group treated with ozone had included significantly higher numbers of patients with more adverse prognostic factors such as older age, larger size of metastatic cervical adenopathies, and higher percentage of patients with metastases at distance [ 65 ].…”

Ozone Therapy and Cancer

“…Yapılan bazı çalışmalarda; oksijen tedavisinin radyoterapi ve kemoterapiyle birlikte uygulanmasının yararlı olup olmadığı araştırılmış, ancak net bir fayda gözlenmemiştir. Doğrudan tümörlerin içine veya kan içerisine hidrojen peroksit enjekte etmenin de herhangi yararı gösterilememiştir (14,18,19). 2008 yılında gerçekleştirilen bir çalışmada tavşanlardaki tümörlerin bazıları hiçbir tedavi olmadan kendiliğinden kaybolmuş, ancak normal oksijen verilenlerde daha fazla tümör kaybolmuştur; ozon verildiğinde ise kaybolan tümör sayısı daha da artmıştır.…”