# Salvage therapy

Source: https://onco.cc/terms/salvage-therapy/  
OnCo record `salvage-therapy` (Term). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

Treatment given after the first treatment has failed or the cancer has come back, aiming to rescue the situation. It can still be curative (salvage surgery after organ-preservation fails) or a later line of palliation.

## Summary

Salvage surgery removes the organ when chemoradiation or watch-and-wait fails (laryngectomy, cystectomy, abdominoperineal resection, TME after regrowth). Salvage radiotherapy treats a rising PSA after prostatectomy; salvage chemotherapy (ICE, DHAP, GDP) followed by autologous transplant was the standard for relapsed lymphoma until CAR-T proved superior in second line (ZUMA-7, TRANSFORM). Organ-preservation strategies are only safe where salvage is feasible and centres have the surgical capacity to deliver it.

## Fields

- Kind: Term
- Last checked: 2026-09-09
- Also known as: salvage; salvage chemotherapy; salvage surgery; salvage radiotherapy; salvage treatment; salvage regimen; salvage cystectomy; salvage laryngectomy; salvage transplant

## Sources

- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvage_therapy
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvage_therapy

## Connected records

- terms: [Autologous stem cell transplant (ASCT)](https://onco.cc/terms/autologous-transplant/), [Bridging therapy](https://onco.cc/terms/bridging-therapy/), [Lines of therapy](https://onco.cc/terms/first-line/), [Organ preservation (watch-and-wait, bladder-sparing, larynx preservation)](https://onco.cc/terms/organ-preservation/), [R-CHOP (lymphoma chemoimmunotherapy)](https://onco.cc/terms/r-chop/), [Re-irradiation](https://onco.cc/terms/re-irradiation/), [Relapsed / refractory (R/R)](https://onco.cc/terms/relapsed-refractory/), [Stem cell transplant in lymphoma: what it is still for](https://onco.cc/terms/lymphoma-tx-transplant-role/)
- fronts: [Chemotherapy](https://onco.cc/fronts/chemotherapy/), [Surgery & Interventional](https://onco.cc/fronts/surgery/)
- trials: [ARTISTIC meta-analysis](https://onco.cc/trials/artistic-meta-analysis/), [GETUG-AFU 16](https://onco.cc/trials/getug-afu-16/), [GETUG-AFU 17](https://onco.cc/trials/getug-afu-17/), [RADICALS-HD](https://onco.cc/trials/radicals-hd/), [RADICALS-RT](https://onco.cc/trials/radicals-rt/), [RAVES (TROG 08.03/ANZUP)](https://onco.cc/trials/raves/), [SWOG 8794](https://onco.cc/trials/swog-8794/), [TRANSFORM](https://onco.cc/trials/transform/), [ZUMA-7](https://onco.cc/trials/zuma-7/)

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JSON: https://onco.cc/api/v1/entities/salvage-therapy.json