Clinical staging and the tendency of malignant pleural mesotheliomas to remain localized.

Thirty-two patients who had been treated for diffuse, malignant pleural mesotheliomas were retrospectively staged according to the system of Butchart. Nineteen of the 26 patients who were seen with disease confined to one hemithorax have died. Twelve patients died without progression to a higher clinical stage, and only 1 patient died of systemic metastases. Nineteen of the 32 patients died of local tumor invasion. Regimens containing Adriamycin (doxorubicin hydrochloride) appeared to prolong the survival of patients with epithelial-type tumors. Combination chemotherapy, designed to treat soft-tissue sarcomas, produced partial responses in a small number of patients.