Treatment of Progressive or Recurrent Retinoblastoma

For information about the treatments listed below, see the Treatment Option Overview section.

Treatment of progressive or recurrent intraocular retinoblastoma may include the following:

• External-beam radiation therapy or plaque radiotherapy.
• Cryotherapy.
• Thermotherapy.
• Systemic chemotherapy or ophthalmic artery infusion chemotherapy.
• Intravitreal chemotherapy.
• Surgery (enucleation).
• A clinical trial of targeted therapy with an oncolytic virus that targets the RB1 gene and is injected into the tumor.
• A clinical trial that checks a sample of the patient's tumor for certain gene changes. The type of targeted therapy that will be given to the patient depends on the type of gene change.

Treatment of progressive or recurrent extraocular retinoblastoma may include the following:

• Systemic chemotherapy and external-beam radiation therapy for retinoblastoma that comes back after surgery to remove the eye.
• Systemic chemotherapy followed by high-dose chemotherapy with stem cell rescue and external-beam radiation therapy.
• A clinical trial that checks a sample of the patient's tumor for certain gene changes. The type of targeted therapy that will be given to the patient depends on the type of gene change.

Use our clinical trial search to find NCI-supported cancer clinical trials that are accepting patients. You can search for trials based on the type of cancer, the age of the patient, and where the trials are being done. General information about clinical trials is also available.