To investigate the mode and relative amount of cell death after the different treatments and schedules, morphological assignment of necrosis was blind-performed by a pathologist experienced in Haematoxylin–Eosin–Saffron staining of tumour samples with routinely deployed clinical criteria, and apoptosis was determined by the presence of active caspase-3 proteolytic fragment under immunohistochemical staining. Here, CASP3 is linked to neoplasm.