Optimal Adjuvant Therapy of Head and Neck Squamous Cancer After Primary Surgical Resection. [Review]

Abstract

Optimal selection of patients for adjuvant therapy following primary surgery for head and neck squamous cancer is challenging. Decision-making depends on a range of patient and disease factors including the presence or otherwise of a host of pathologic risk factors. Postoperative radiotherapy is the standard of care for advanced disease and has a role for early-stage disease in the presence of multiple risk factors. Concurrent chemotherapy improves outcomes for high-risk pathology having extranodal extension and/or very close/positive margins, and in these patients, immunotherapy in the perioperative period is associated with better locoregional control. Adjuvant therapy has significant toxicity.