Abstract:
Oral cancer is one of the most prevalent malignant tumors of the head and neck region. In China, the incidence of oral cancer ranks second among all cancers of the head and neck and second only to that of nasopharyngeal carcinoma. More than 50% of patients with oral cancer are either at a locally advanced stage at initial diagnosis or have already developed distant metastasis. Depending on the cancer stage in a patient, multidisciplinary treatment, including surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy, immunotherapy, and targeted therapy, is currently the standard treatment for oral cancer. Despite the variety of treatment modalities, the 2-/5-year overall survival rate of patients with oral cancer is rather low and cannot meet clinical needs. Therefore, there is an urgent need to develop more effective and comprehensive treatment modalities to improve the prognosis of oral cancer. In this study, we reviewed a new multidisciplinary comprehensive treatment mode for oral cancer in recent years and the progress in radiotherapy for oral cancer under this new mode.