Introduction: Efforts are going on for development of new drugs for epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC). We assessed safety profile of bevacizumab, a VEGF receptor blocking antibody in treatment of EOC.
Methods: We assigned women with EOC to carboplatin (area under curve, 5 or 6) and paclitaxel (175 mg/square meter of body-surface area), given every 3 weeks for 6 cycles, or to this regimen plus bevacizumab (15 mg/kilogram body weight), given concurrently every 3 weeks for 5 or 6 cycles and continued for 30 additional cycles. Primary outcome measures was safety profile of bevacizumab and secondary outcome was to see progression free survival (PFS).
Results: Out of 30 patients, 10 were in Bevacizuma arm (Arm A) and 20 in conventional chemotherapy arm (Arm B). Haematological toxicity, GI perforation and proteinuria was similar in both. Other toxicities e.g. bleeding complication (p = 0.002) and hypertension (p = 0.04) was more in Arm A. PFS was similar in both arms; 24 months in Arm A and 22 months in Arm B (p = 0.565). 4 (40%) patients in arm A discontinued treatment, two (20%) because of disease progression after PFS of 9 and 6 months, two because of development of toxicity considered to be due to bevacizumab; of which one developed jejenal perforation and disease progression after PFS of 6 months and 1 because of development of persistent proteinuria of grade 3 after 18 months.
Conclusion: Bevacizumab therapy does not improve PFS in EOC but increases toxicity spectrum of chemotherapy.
Dose modification for haematological toxicity: a survey of Australian medical oncologists
