[Radio- and chemotherapy of cancer of the esophagus].

Surgical resection has been the mainstay of therapy for localised carcinoma of the oesophagus. However, the five-year survival rate after curative resection is only 20 to 30%, and other treatments have been tried to improve these results. Radiotherapy, chemotherapy and sequential or combined chemoradiotherapy have been used, either alone or in combination with surgery. Radiotherapy and chemotherapy do not improve survival and are restricted to very limited cases. Results of exclusive combined chemoradiotherapy are very similar to those of surgery, with five-year survival rate of 20%. The promising results of chemoradiotherapy followed by surgery need to be confirmed by further trials. Good survival rates obtained for responders to chemoradiotherapy require to find better means for identifying such patients before treatment.