Adaptive Radiation Therapy for Intact Thymoma: An Illustrative Report

Abstract

Background/aim: Adaptive radiation therapy (ART) is a technique capable of reducing radiation dose to normal tissue without compromising local control. For potentially resectable thymoma, induction therapy is standard of care. Because large disease volume is common in this context, ART has been suggested to reduce toxicity from induction chemoradiation. This has not been previously illustrated in the literature.

Case report: A 38-year-old man with initially unresectable thymoma was treated with induction chemoradiation including cisplatin and etoposide. He received 45 Gy in 25 fractions and ART was utilized to shrink the radiotherapy field for the final 10 fractions.

Results: Thymectomy showed Masaoka stage III disease with negative margins. He experienced no treatment-related toxicity and has no evidence of disease 8 years after diagnosis.

Conclusion: Induction chemoradiotherapy with ART appears to be feasible, safe, and efficacious for locally advanced intact thymoma.

Keywords: Adaptive radiation therapy; WHO Type B2 thymoma; induction chemoradiation; intact thymoma; radiosensitive malignancy.