Chemotherapy, Immunotherapy, and Chemoradiotherapy

Chemotherapy has many roles in the treatment of esophageal squamous cell carcinoma (ESCC). It has been used for patients with advanced or recurrent cancer to prolong survival and/or alleviate the symptoms caused by cancer, and it has also been used for perioperative therapy combined with surgery to increase the complete resection rate and improve survival. At the same time, chemotherapy has been used with radiation therapy as definitive chemoradiotherapy (CRT) for localized ESCC. Responses to chemotherapy may be evaluated via endoscopy, computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, and other modalities, which are the same modalities used at diagnosis, as described in Chaps. 3 , 4 , and 7 . There is no current consensus on the optimal follow-up duration, although evaluation frequencies of every 2 or 3 months for advanced cancer and evaluations at every course for neoadjuvant chemotherapy or CRT are the usual manner.