Abstract
The primary objective of combining chemotherapy with radiation is to achieve an improved therapeutic result, i.e. enhanced tumour response or reduced normal tissue toxicity. A combination of chemotherapy and radiotherapy results in some advantages which are not possible with single-modality therapy. These include providing maximum cell kill within the range of toxicity tolerated by the host for each drug, offering a broader coverage of resistant cell lines in a tumour cell population and preventing or slowing development of any new drug-resistant cell lines. Pathways contributing to radiosensitization by chemotherapeutic or molecularly targeted agents include initial induction of radiation-induced DNA damage, DNA damage repair, modulation of cell-cycle kinetics, tumour microenvironment and cell repopulation.
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Mukherji, A. (2018). Using Concurrent or Sequential Chemotherapy and Biomolecules. In: Basics of Planning and Management of Patients during Radiation Therapy. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-6659-7_19
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