Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2016 Mar;12(5):669-85.
doi: 10.2217/fon.15.335. Epub 2016 Feb 1.

The role of neoadjuvant therapy in pancreatic cancer: a review

Suzanne Russo  1 , John Ammori  2 , Jennifer Eads  3 , Jennifer Dorth  1
Affiliations
Review

The role of neoadjuvant therapy in pancreatic cancer: a review

Suzanne Russo et al. Future Oncol. 2016 Mar.

Abstract

Controversy remains regarding neoadjuvant approaches in the treatment of pancreatic cancer. Neoadjuvant therapy has several potential advantages over adjuvant therapy including earlier delivery of systemic treatment, in vivo assessment of response, increased resectability rate in borderline resectable patients and increased margin-negative resection rate. At present, there are no randomized data favoring neoadjuvant over adjuvant therapy and multiple neoadjuvant approaches are under investigation. Combination chemotherapy regimens including 5-fluorouracil, irinotecan and oxaliplatin, gemcitabine with or without abraxane, or docetaxel and capecitabine have been used in the neoadjuvant setting. Radiation and chemoradiation have also been incorporated into neoadjuvant strategies, and delivery of alternative fractionation regimens is being explored. This review provides an overview of neoadjuvant therapies for pancreatic cancer.

Keywords: 5-fluorouracil; abraxane; capecitabine; chemotherapy; docetaxel; gemcitabine; irinotecan; oxaliplatin; pancreatic cancer; radiation; surgery.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Financial & competing interests disclosure

The authors have no relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript. This includes employment, consultancies, honoraria, stock ownership or options, expert testimony, grants or patents received or pending, or royalties.

No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.

References

    1. Griffin JF, Smalley SR, Jewell W, et al. Patterns of failure after curative resection of pancreatic carcinoma. Cancer. 1990;66(1):56–61. - PubMed
    1. Sohn TA, Yeo CJ, Cameron JL, et al. Resected adenocarcinoma of the pancreas-616 patients: results, outcomes, and prognostic indicators. J. Gastrointest. Surg. 2000;4(6):567–579. - PubMed
    1. Neoptolemos JP, Stocken DD, Bassi C, et al. Adjuvant chemotherapy with fluorouracil plus folinic acid vs gemcitabine following pancreatic cancer resection: a randomized controlled trial. JAMA. 2010;304(10):1073–1081. - PubMed
    1. Conroy T, Desseigne F, Ychou M, et al. FOLFIRINOX versus gemcitabine for metastatic pancreatic cancer. N. Engl. J. Med. 2011;364(19):1817–1825. - PubMed
    1. Poplin E, Feng Y, Berlin J, et al. Phase III, randomized study of gemcitabine and oxaliplatin versus gemcitabine (fixed-dose rate infusion) compared with gemcitabine (30 mininfusion) in patients with pancreatic carcinoma E6201: a trial of the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group. J. Clin. Oncol. 2009;27(23):3778–3785. - PMC - PubMed

MeSH terms