Involved Field Elective Volume De-Intensification Radiation Therapy for Head and Neck Cancer

This study aims to significantly improve the acute and late morbidity of patients with oropharyngeal and laryngeal squamous cell carcinoma both by tailoring the elective irradiation only to regions with a legitimate risk of recurrence (\> 5%) and by lowering the elective dose to 40 Gy. Level IB will not be electively treated unless it is involved with pathologic or suspicious lymphadenopathy. Level V will not be treated unless two or more ipsilateral nodal levels are involved (or level V itself has pathologic or suspicious adenopathy). Levels III and IV will only be irradiated if the immediately proximal level contains pathologic lymphadenopathy (i.e. level III irradiated if level II is positive; level IV irradiated if level III is positive). We anticipate that this approach should dramatically improve the acute and late complication profile.