Thirty previously untreated patients with advanced germ cell testicular tumours received PVB or BEP. Four patients with bulky disease underwent debulking surgery before initiating chemotherapy and two between cycles of treatment. Twenty-seven (90%) complete responses, two (6.7%) partial responses and one (3.3%) no changes were observed. Both partial remissions were rendered disease-free with surgical removal of residual disease. Four patients presented tumour progression with PVB or BEP, three of whom developed a non-germ cell malignancy within the germ cell tumour. One toxic death and three patients with radiological evidence of reversible interstitial pneumonitis attributed to bleomycin were observed. With a median follow-up time of 38.5 months, range 2.5 to 130 months, 83.3% of the patients are alive and free of disease. Actuarial overall survival is 85.6%. This study confirms once again the high percentage of curability of this disease.