Studies of the efficacy of postoperative radiation therapy for patients with cervical lymph node metastasis from oral squamous cell carcinoma

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of postoperative radiation therapy of the neck in patients with oral squamous cell carcinoma who had lymph node metastasis on pathological examination. The following results were obtained. Eighteen patients received postoperative radiation therapy (RT+ group), and 42 patients did not receive postoperative radiation therapy (RT- group). The recurrent rate in the neck was 11.1% in the RT+ group and 25.6% in the RT- group. The overall survival rate was 76.9% in the RT+ group and 60.6% in the RT- group. This difference was not significant. There were significant differences in the overall survival rate between the RT+ group and RT- group when nodal metastases were found at multiple levels or when nodal metastases were associated with extracapsular spread. The overall survival rate did not differ significantly between the RT+ group and RT- group when the number of nodal metastases was three or more or when the farthest metastatic nodes were found at levels III, IV, or V. (author)