Tumour Repopulation During Treatment for Head and Neck Cancer: Clinical Evidence, Mechanisms and Minimizing Strategies

For example, experimental data have shown that the accelerated repopulation response of squamous epithelia (Dörr 1977) is analogous to the acute response of normal tissue after injury. It is suggested (Trott and Kummermehr 1991) that squamous cell carcinomas retain some of the homeostatic control mechanisms characteristic of their tissue of origin. Similarly, data from this and other studies support the evidence that normal and cancerous squamous epithelia share the same behaviour in response to injury (Trott and Kummermehr 1991, Denham 1996, Trott 1999). Therefore, the mechanisms responsible for normal tissue repopulation may be considered relevant for tumour repopulation.