What Researchers Did
Researchers conducted a prospective non-randomised study comparing photodynamic therapy alone to photodynamic therapy combined with hyperbaric oxygen in 75 patients with carcinoma of the esophagus and the esophago-gastric junction.
What They Found
They found that while both treatments improved stenosis diameter, the combined PDT/hyperbaric oxygen group showed significantly better reductions in dysphagia score (P=0.0064) and tumour length (P=0.0002).
Furthermore, patients receiving combined therapy had a median overall survival of 12 months, significantly longer than the 7 months observed in the PDT-alone group (P=0.0098).
Canadian Relevance
This study has no direct Canadian connection as it was conducted in Europe.
Study Limitations
A significant limitation of this study is its prospective non-randomised design, which may introduce bias and limit the generalizability of the findings.