THE EFFECTIVENESS OF PHOTODYNAMIC THERAPY IN THE SURGERY OF RECURRENT LARYNGEAL AND TRACHEAL PAPILLOMATOSIS

Abstract

Recurrent respiratory papillomatosis (RRP) is the most common, as well as the most expensive benign neoplasm of the respiratory tract in the United States. There are reports of the clinical benefits of therapeutic vaccines for patients with RRP. But none of the reports have definitively demonstrated the induction of HPV-specific T cell responses, suggesting that some or all of the clinical benefit caused by this treatment was due to local, non-specific antiviral inflammatory reactions involving type I interferon. To date, at least 50 different treatment methods are known, none of which guarantees a lasting cure. The problem of radical treatment of respiratory papillomatosis still remains unresolved.