Summary

Purpose: A phase II study was performed in patients with unresectable or metastatic gastric cancer evaluating the effi-cacy of a new chemotherapy schedule combining epirubicin and cisplatin with a continuous ambulatory infusion of 5-fluorouracil (ECF). Patients and methods: One hundred thirty-nine consecu-tive, previously untreated patients were given ECF. Of these, 128 had measurable disease. Epirubicin (50 mg/m2 i.v.) and cisplatin (60 mg/m2 i.v.) were administered every three weeks for 8 cycles during a 21 week continuous i.v. infusion of 5-fluorouracil (200 mg/m2/day). In total 773 cycles of chemotherapy were given. Results: Objective tumour responses was seen in 91 (71%) of the 128 patients with measurable disease, of which 15 (12%) had a complete response. Twenty patients with locally advanced disease responding to ECF had attempted resec-tion of the primary- 11 (55%) were completely removed, 4 of these had no residual tumour in the resected specimen. The overall median survival was 8.2 months with 1 and 2 year survivals of 30 % and 10 % respectively. Grade 3 or 4 emesis occurred in 13%, stomatitis in 7%, diarrhoea in 4%, infection in 6%, leucopenia in 21 % and thrombocytopenia in 8 % of patients. Myelosuppression delayed treatment in 39 (5%) of the 773 cycles. Six of the 139 patients (4.3%) had treatment related deaths. There was no measurable reduction in quality of life during chemotherapy, while 67 % of the 66 patients with dysphagia had complete resolution of this symptom. Conclusions: The ECF regimen displays high anti-tumour activity with moderate toxicity in patients with gastric cancer and in some cases enabled resection of previously inoperable tumours. Key words: chemotherapy, gastro-oesophageal cance