RADIATION MANAGEMENT OF OTHERWISE HOPELESS THORACIC NEOPLASMS

Abstract

Every physician should be aware of his responsibility if he declares a cancer patient hopeless and leaves him to his fate. The term "hopeless" implies the death sentence of the individual patient. In medical use this term can mean either incurability or no possibility of a favorable influence on the patient's condition, even of a palliative nature. In our interpretation, the term "hopeless" should be reserved for the very few patients whose suffering might be increased or whose fate might be speeded by any method of attacking the cancer. These are obviously terminal situations. "Hopeless" is usually applied when a thoracic neoplasm is inoperable, although we often see patients with lesions considered operable who have no chance of cure by surgery, owing to spread of the neoplasm. Further, we know that some surgically hopeless patients can be cured by radiation, and that good palliation can be obtained in excess of