Radiation Therapy Plus Porfiromycin in Treating Patients With Stage III or Stage IV Head and Neck Cancer

OBJECTIVES: I. Determine the time to tumor progression in patients with stage III or IV (without distant metastases) head and neck cancer treated with porfiromycin as adjuvant therapy to radiotherapy. II. Determine percentage of patients with locoregional tumor recurrence up to 2 years posttreatment. III. Determine response rate, disease free survival time, and overall survival time in these patients. IV. Evaluate the safety and tolerance of porfiromycin in these patients. OUTLINE: This is a randomized, double blind, placebo controlled, multicenter study. Patients are stratified according to primary tumor site (oral vs pharynx vs larynx) and disease stage (both T and N stage: T1-2 vs T3-4 and N0 vs N1-2 vs N3). All patients are randomized to receive either porfiromycin (arm I) or placebo (arm II) as adjuvant therapy to radiation therapy. Both arms follow the same treatment schedule. Daily radiation therapy commences on day 1. Patients receive porfiromycin or placebo by intravenous infusion over 30-60 minutes on day 5 and then on day 46 or 47. Porfiromycin or placebo is administered 30 minutes to 2 hours following radiation therapy. All patients with N3 neck disease (metastases in a lymph node more than 6 cm in greatest dimension) undergo a planned neck dissection following external beam radiation at 4 to 12 weeks following therapy. This surgery is not needed for patients with N3 neck disease who do not have residual disease following radiotherapy. Patients are followed at 4 weeks, then every 2 months for 2 years, and then every 6 months for 3 years. PROJECTED ACCRUAL: A total of 550-600 patients will be accrued for this study within 3 years.