The locoregional failure rate remain high in advanced cervical carcinoma. Chemotherpy(CT) was added to radiotherapy(RT) in order to improve therapeutic result. We performed this study to evaluate the response rate, toxicities and survival benefit of neoadjuvant chemotherapy and to investigate potential role of neoadjuvant chemotherapy in treatment of cervical cancer.

The patients(68 cases of cervical cancer) were divided into two groups ; The one group was neoadjuvant chemotherapy followed by radiotherapy(n=30) and the other was the radiotherapy(n=38) group. The patients were maintained by regular follow-up and evaluated with regards to treatment related toxicity and effectiveness by response using World Health Organization criteria and 5-year survival rate.

30 patients were assigned to receive neoadjuvant chemotherapy. After chemotherpy, the overall clinical response rate was 46.7%. The response rate of neoadjuvant chemotherapy followed radiotherapy was higher than that of the radiotherapy in cervical cancer (100% vs 84.2%). The 5-year survival rate of patients was not different between two groups(p>0.05). Toxicities of chemotherapy were generally tolerable and usually well resolved with conservative treatment.

Neoadjuvant chemotherapy followed radiotherapy help to improve response rate but did not affect survival benefit in the cervical cancer in this study. However, well controlled long-term prospective study will be need to get firm conclusion.