Surgery and radiotherapy--competitors or partners?

The past experience of combined radiotherapy and surgery at Memorial Hospital was reviewed. Preoperative radiotherapy seemed to be of value in certain tumors of the head and neck, in esophageal carcinoma, in deeply invading cancers of the bladder without metastasis lymph nodes. There were no recent data on mammary or gynecologic cancer. The previously reported improvement in advanced cancer of the colon treated with preoperative radiation is now equivocal in our more recent data. Preoperative radiotherapy in sarcoma of bone is used but we have no proof of benefit. The author concludes that the partnership of surgery and radiotherapy needs further study.