Resumen
In head and neck cancer, local recurrences are unfortunately common. A more intense local treatment, such as an increased radiation dose to the primary tumour, could potentially prevent some of these recurrencies. Previous studies have not shown an increased risk of side effects with a higher radiotherapy dose. However, the follow-up time in these studies is sometimes limited, and late side effects may then be missed. In our study with a relatively long patient follow-up, we compared survival and side effects in two groups with 215 patients in each group, where one group was treated with standard dose radiotherapy and the other group was treated with a higher dose of radiotherapy. In this study, we found that certain severe side effects are more common after higher doses of radiotherapy compared to after treatment with standard dose radiotherapy.