This year also saw a great number of phase II and III studies presented at the ASCO Annual Meeting, in which new drugs (monoclonal antibodies, small molecules) were investigated as an alternative to or in combination with established mono- and polychemotherapy in patients with recurrences or distance metastases from head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (R/M-HNSCC). The studies now presented here describe the different concepts being applied to drug-based treatment of R/M-HNSCC and illustrate the variety of therapeutic approaches to treatment of recurrences and metastases.