Advantages of intraperitoneal chemotherapy in treatment of ovarian cancer peritoneal carcinomatosis

Abstract

The purpose of the study is to compare antitumor activity of different drugs at their Intraperitoneal (i. p.) and intravenous (i.v.) administration in rats with ovarian cancer peritoneal carcinomatosis. The study was carried out in 124 Wistar female rats with ovarian cancer which was inoculated i. p. After ovarian cancer inoculation rats were randomized in 12 groups, 10 rats in each group. There were six groups where saline (2 ml, i.p. control group) or the drugs (dioxadet 1.5 mg/kg, cisplatin 4mg/kg, mitomycin C 1.5 mg/kg, melphalan 2 mg/kg, paclitaxel 5 mg/kg) were administered i. p. In other six groups saline (2 ml, i. v. control group) and the named above drugs at the same doses were administered i. v. Antitumor effects of the treatment were estimated by increase in survival time (IST) comparing median survival time of rats in different groups. IST for i.p. administration of dioxadet, cisplatin, melphalan, mitomycin C and paclitaxel were 79 % (p < 0.001), 88 % (p < 0.001), 114 % (p < 0.001), 35 % (p < 0.002) and 45 % (p < 0.001) correspondingly compared to i.p. control group while for i.v. administration of these drugs IST were 5 % (p = 0.796), 14 % (p = 0.315), 19 % (p = 0.631), 152 % (p < 0.001) and 81 % (p = 0.023) correspondingly compared to i. v. control group. Thus, i. p. chemotherapy with alkylating agents dioxadet, cisplatin and melphalan is much more effective then their i. v. administration, while antitumor effects of i. p. and i. v. administration of paclitaxel were similar and only mitomycin C is more active at i. v. administration.