Evaluation of oral tegafur-uracil as metronomic therapy following concurrent chemoradiotherapy in patients with non-distant metastatic TNM stage IV nasopharyngeal carcinoma

Background: The study was aimed to evaluate the impact of accumulated oral tegafur-uracil (UFUR) as maintenance chemotherapy on overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) rates after concurrent chemoradiotherapy (CCRT) for complete remission (CR) in non-distant metastatic TNM stage IV nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC). Methods: Data were retrospectively analyzed from a database of patients with non-distant metastatic TNM stage IV NPC, composed of those who underwent CCRT for CR from January 2010 through December 2017. Results: Thirty-three patients were treated with CCRT (the non-UFUR group), and the other 37 patients were treated with the same regimen, followed by additional oral UFUR (the UFUR group). Importantly, the 5-year OS rates were 91.89% in the UFUR group and 57.58% in the non-UFUR group (P =.004). Conclusions: Adding UFUR to CCRT was found to significantly improve the DFS and OS rates of patients with non-distant metastatic TNM stage IV NPC. The authors cautiously suggest UFUR as possible maintenance therapy following CCRT.