In all, 144 patients with advanced cardiac cancers have been treated by photodynamic therapy (PDT), combined chemotherapy and chemotherapy alone from September 1982 to July 1990. A total of 5 mg kg-1 haematoporphyrin derivative (HpD) was intravenously given 48-72 h prior to PDT. The light source was an argon dye laser with an output beam of 630 nm. The irradiation time varied between 12 and 25 min with a fluence of 100-350 mW cm-2. The entire tumour was irradiated with a light dose of 100-250 J cm-2. The combination of UFT and mitomycin C was used as standard chemotherapy. There were 26 responders out of 55 patients (47.3%) in the group treated with PDT alone, 24 out of 41 (58.5%) in the PDT+chemotherapy group, and 24 out of 48 (50.0%) in the chemotherapy alone group. In the PDT+chemotherapy group 19.5% patients had complete remission, which was better than the other two groups (5.5%, 8.3%, p less than 0.05). The following survey of all patients lasted from six months to seven years. The results suggest that a combination of PDT and chemotherapy may prove effective.