The earliest successes with chemotherapy occurred in blood and lymphatic cancers. By the late 1970s, combinations of drugs helped to cure some patients with testicular and other "solid" tumors.

Since then, adjuvant chemotherapy – providing drugs after cancer surgery to help prevent cancer recurrence – has improved the outlook for patients with common early-stage cancers, including colon, breast and lung cancer. The use of neo-adjuvant chemotherapy – giving drugs before surgery to shrink tumors – is helping patients with cancers once considered inoperable.