Inefficacy of cisplatin and etoposide as salvage therapy for children with recurrent or unresponsive soft tissue sarcoma.

Cisplatin (CPDD) and etoposide (VP-16) have activity as single agents in children with recurrent soft tissue sarcoma, with response rates approximating 20%. Sixteen evaluable patients with soft tissue sarcoma, 0.9 to 16 years of age, were treated with a combination of CPDD (75-100 mg/m2 iv X 1) and VP-16 (100-150 mg/m2/day iv X 3-5) every 3 weeks after recurrence or failure to respond to standard therapy. Toxicity consisted of vomiting and myelosuppression. There were no complete responses, and only two children (12.5%) had partial responses lasting 6 weeks. Every patient died of progressive tumor. CPDD and VP-16, as given on this study, had minimal activity.