Safety and efficacy of everolimus in Asian patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC) who failed previous vascular endothelial growth factor receptor-tyrosine kinase inhibitor (VEGFr-TKI) therapy: A subanalysis of REACT.
e15064 Background: Some targeted agents have shown variable safety profiles in Asian vs non-Asian patients with mRCC. A retrospective analysis of sunitinib in Korean patients with mRCC found increased incidence and severity of certain adverse events (AEs) compared with previous global trials (Hong et al. Cancer Res Treat. 2009;41:67-72). The open-label, expanded-access program REACT (RAD001 Expanded Access Clinical Trial in RCC; NCT00655252) provided everolimus, a mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) inhibitor, before its regulatory approval to 1367 patients with VEGFr-TKI refractory mRCC from 34 countries. Final results of REACT were recently published (Grünwald et al. Eur J Cancer. 2012;48:324-332). This analysis compared study end points in Asian patients with those in the total REACT population. Methods: The primary objective of REACT was to assess the safety of everolimus 10 mg/day, as determined by the overall occurrence of grade 3/4 AEs. Best overall tumor response was evaluated based on RECIST 1.0. Results: Baseline characteristics of Asian patients (n = 109; from South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, and Singapore) were similar to those of the total study population. Median duration of everolimus exposure was longer in Asian patients than in the total population: 24.1 (range, 2.0-72.7) vs 14.0 (0.1-83.7) weeks. Overall incidence of grade 3/4 AEs was slightly higher in Asian patients than in the total population (70.6% vs 61.6%); common grade 3/4 AEs in Asian patients and the total population, respectively, included anemia (26.6% vs 13.4%), hyperglycemia (11.9% vs 5.5%), pneumonia (10.1% vs 4.2%), stomatitis (6.4% vs 5.4%), thrombocytopenia (3.7% vs 1.0%), and pneumonitis (3.7% vs 2.7%). More patients in the Asian population than in the total population had achieved disease control: partial response, 3.7% vs 1.7%; stable disease, 67.0% vs 51.6%. Conclusions: In this subanalysis of REACT, Asian patients treated with everolimus experienced a greater clinical benefit with a slightly higher incidence of AEs. These results are supportive of the use of everolimus in the Asian population.