Radiation Therapy, Amifostine, and Chemotherapy in Treating Young Patients With Newly Diagnosed Nasopharyngeal Cancer

PRIMARY OBJECTIVES: I. Determine the response rate, overall survival, and event-free survival of children with advanced nasopharyngeal carcinoma who are treated with induction chemotherapy followed by concurrent chemoradiotherapy and amifostine. SECONDARY OBJECTIVES: I. Characterize the role of Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) in the pathogenesis of nasopharyngeal carcinoma in children. II. Investigate the predictive value of the detection of EBV DNA in the peripheral blood of children with nasopharyngeal carcinoma. III. Determine the incidence of NUT rearrangements in childhood nasopharyngeal carcinoma. IV. Determine the radioprotective effect of amifostine when given daily prior to radiation therapy. OUTLINE: This is a nonrandomized, multicenter study. Patients are stratified according to stage of disease (I or IIA \[stratum I\] vs IIB-IV \[stratum II\]). STRATUM I: Patients undergo radiotherapy 5 days a week for 8 weeks. Patients also receive amifostine subcutaneously on the same days they undergo radiotherapy. STRATUM II: INDUCTION THERAPY (weeks 1-9): Patients receive cisplatin IV over 6 hours on day 1 and fluorouracil IV continuously on days 1-4. Treatment repeats every 3 weeks for 3 courses in the absence of disease progression or unacceptable toxicity. Patients with responding or stable disease proceed to consolidation therapy. CONSOLIDATION THERAPY (weeks 10-18): Patients undergo radiotherapy and receive amifostine as in stratum I. Patients also receive cisplatin IV over 6 hours on days 1 and 22 (2 courses). After completion of study treatment, patients are followed periodically for 10 years.