The outcome of ovarian cancer remains poor with conventional therapy. 
Intraperitoneal chemotherapy has some advantages over systemic chemotherapy, 
including favorable pharmacokinetics and optimal treatment timing. 
Intraoperative hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC) provides 
improved exposure of the entire seroperitoneal surface to the agent and utilizes 
the direct cytoxic and drug-enhancing effect of hyperthermia. While standard 
normothermic, nonintraoperative, intraperitoneal chemotherapy has been 
demonstrated to be beneficial in randomized trials and meta-analyses, there are 
no data from randomized HIPEC trials available yet. Cautious extrapolation of 
data from standard normothermic, nonintraoperative, intraperitoneal chemotherapy 
and data from Phase II and nonrandomized comparative studies suggest that HIPEC 
delivered at the time of surgery for ovarian cancer has definite potential. Data 
from ongoing randomized HIPEC trials to adequately answer the question of 
whether the addition of HIPEC actually prolongs survival in patients with 
peritoneal dissemination of primary and recurrent ovarian cancer are awaited in 
the near future.