Hyperthermic intrathoracic chemotherapy (HITOC) is part of a surgical strategy employed in the treatment of various pleural malignancies.
Metastases to the pleural surface from any primary tumor represents Stage IV disease which carries in general an extremely poor prognosis.
In addition; in highly selected situations the pleura can be involved by local spread or “seeding” from thoracic tumors such as lung, esophageal, and thymic cancers.
However, the surgical removal of large pleural deposits with infusion of hyperthermic chemotherapy may offer significant survival and symptomatic benefit for patients in this disease category.
The goal of surgical cytoreduction is to remove all gross disease including tumors that are in resectable areas of the lung or other structures and any large pleural nodules.