[Pretherapeutic detection of tumour resistance to cytostatic agents].

Malignant tumours--even when they are of similar localization and histological type--very often react differently to cytostatic treatment. In order to determine the sensitivity or the resistance of malignant tumours, various test systems have been developed over the past few years: a) tissue or organ culture, b) assay for clonogenic tumour cells in soft agar, c) short-term culture of tumour cells, d) heterotransplantation of tumour material to nude mice. Practicability and limits of these methods are compared on the basis of the correlation between predictive test results and clinical results.