Clinical Analysis of Glioma: Anaplastic Astrocytoma and Glioblastoma

Abstract

There have been many reports on the effects of radiotherapy and chemotherapy and on the factors influencing the prognosis of malignant gliomas [1, 3, 5, 6, 10–12, 15, 17, 18]. The approach of most early investigations was historical [e.g., 3, 17, 18], but in recent years the number of randomized studies reporting on the effects of radiotherapy or chemotherapy has increased [1, 5, 10–12]. Among such studies, some have acknowledged the effectiveness of adjuvant chemotherapy [1, 3, 10, 15, 18], but others report negative findings in this regard [5, 12, 17]. In contrast, there has been some uniformity of opinion concerning the effectiveness of radiotherapy [2, 3, 13, 16, 18, 19]. Among such studies, however, many have reported the effects of adjuvant therapy for a group in which glioblastoma and other anaplastic gliomas were discussed together as a single disease entity [1, 3, 5, 12, 17, 18].