scholarly journals Refractory metastatic colorectal cancer: challenges and solutions during the COVID-19 pandemic

2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 256-259
Author(s):  
Marina I. Sekacheva ◽  
Anastasia S. Fatyanova ◽  
Daur A. Meretukov ◽  
Angelina V Zhilenkova ◽  
Aleksandr S. Rusanov ◽  
...  

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is one of the leading cancers in terms of prevalence and mortality. Almost 1/4 of patients with CRC have metastases at the initial presentation. The survival rate of this group of patients remains low. With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, cancer patients have faced difficulties in getting diagnosis or treatment, which could potentially lead to an increase in late-stage tumors and mortality. This situation required changes in approaches to the treatment of cancer patients, such as replacing drugs with tablet forms, schemes with long intervals, and much more. It is known that about 50% of patients with metastatic colorectal cancer survive in satisfactory condition until the 3rd line drug therapy or longer. One of the main drugs for this category of patients is regorafenib, which, thanks to the tablet formulation, has become especially important in the COVID-19 pandemic. In numerous clinical studies, the drug showed an increase in patient overall survival and good safety profile. In addition, there is growing evidence of the effect of regorafenib on tumor sensitivity to treatment with platinum drugs, irinotecan, and EGFR inhibitors.

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (24) ◽  
pp. 4244-4249
Author(s):  
Trinh Le Huy ◽  
My Hanh Bui ◽  
Toi Chu Dinh ◽  
Hoang Thi Hong Xuyen

BACKGROUND: In recent times, scientists have found new treatments for colorectal cancer patients. AIM: The study is to evaluate the efficacy and toxicity of triplet combination chemotherapy of 5-fluorouracil/leucovorin, oxaliplatin, and irinotecan (FOLFOXIRI) for patients with metastatic colorectal cancer in stage IV. METHODS: Uncontrolled clinical trial carried on 39 stage IV colorectal cancer patients. RESULTS: The overall response rate of the treatment was 79.4%. The average progression-free survival was 13.4 ± 9 months. The overall survival rate at 12th month and 24th month were 90% and 76%, respectively. The proportion of granulocytopenia was 48.9%, no grade 3 or 4. Side effect beyond hematology was most seen in hepatic toxicity with 52.5%, mainly at grade 1. Vomiting was 18.3%, all at grade 1. Other adverse event was very low at percentage. CONCLUSIONS: The triplet combination FOLFOXIRI chemotherapy improves the outcome of patients with metastatic colorectal cancer regarding rate of response, overall survival rate and progression-free survival, and the level of toxicity was acceptable.


Cancers ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (7) ◽  
pp. 1705
Author(s):  
Elena De Mattia ◽  
Jerry Polesel ◽  
Rossana Roncato ◽  
Adrien Labriet ◽  
Alessia Bignucolo ◽  
...  

A new paradigm in cancer chemotherapy derives from the interaction between chemotherapeutics, including irinotecan and 5-fluorouracil (5-FU), and the immune system. The patient’s immune response can modulate chemotherapy effectiveness, and, on the other hand, chemotherapeutic agents can foster tumor cell immunogenicity. On these grounds, the analysis of the cancer patients’ immunogenetic characteristics and their effect on survival after chemotherapy represent a new frontier. This study aims to identify genetic determinants in the immuno-related pathways predictive of overall survival (OS) after FOLFIRI (irinotecan, 5-FU, leucovorin) therapy. Two independent cohorts comprising a total of 335 patients with metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC) homogeneously treated with first-line FOLFIRI were included in the study. The prognostic effect of 192 tagging genetic polymorphisms in 34 immune-related genes was evaluated using the bead array technology. The IL15RA rs7910212-C allele was associated with worse OS in both discovery (HR: 1.57, p = 0.0327, Bootstrap p-value = 0.0280) and replication (HR:1.71, p = 0.0411) cohorts. Conversely, SMAD3 rs7179840-C allele was associated with better OS in both discovery (HR:0.65, p = 0.0202, Bootstrap p-value = 0.0203) and replication (HR:0.61, p = 0.0216) cohorts. A genetic prognostic score was generated integrating IL15RA-rs7910212 and SMAD3-rs7179840 markers with inflammation-related prognostic polymorphisms we previously identified in the same study population (i.e., PXR [NR1I2]-rs1054190, VDR-rs7299460). The calculated genetic score successfully discriminated patients with different survival probabilities (p < 0.0001 log-rank test). These findings provide new insight on the prognostic value of genetic determinants, such as IL15RA and SMAD3 markers, and could offer a new decision tool to improve the clinical management of patients with mCRC receiving FOLFIRI.


2020 ◽  
Vol 38 (4_suppl) ◽  
pp. 70-70
Author(s):  
Senem Karabulut ◽  
İzzet Dogan ◽  
Çiğdem Usul Afşar ◽  
Mehmet Karabulut ◽  
Sule Karaman ◽  
...  

70 Background: The efficacy and tolerability of modern cytotoxic chemotherapy regimens used in malnourished metastatic colorectal cancer patients is uncertain. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of malnutrition on efficacy and tolerability of cytotoxic chemotherapy and overall survival in mCRC patients. Methods: In this multicenter study, demographic, oncologic and nutritional data were collected prospectively from mCRC patients. Nutritional status were evaluated on the basis of NRI, BMI and WL before the first chemotherapy, after the first and second chemotherapy. To determine the inter-treatment weight loss toxicity assessment was included to theese parameters after each chemotherapy. NRIs were examined in 3 categories as ‘no malnutrition’ (NRI >97.5), ‘moderate malnutrition’ (97.5 ≥ NRI ≥83.5) or ‘severe malnutrition’ (NRI <83.5). Response to treatment and drug-induced toxicities were assessed based on RECIST 1.1 and CTCAE version 4.0 respectively. Results: 137 mCRC patients were prospectively included. Median age was 48 (range 18-83). Primary location was colon in 66% of patients, 84% of them source was left colon. Malnutrition was detected in 39% of the cases. Response rate to treatment was 24 %. Moderate / severe malnutrition was associated with multipl site of metastases, WHO PS of 1, over the median value of CEA/CA 19-9 levels (p=0.003, p=0.03, p<0.001, and p=0.02; respectively). Hypoalbuminemia and moderate/severe malnutrition were associated with all types of toxicity (p<0.001 and p<0.001). Moderate/severe malnutrition was associated with thrombocytopenia, and diarrhea following chemotherapy predominately, (p=0.02 and p=0.04; respectively). In moderate/severe malnutrition group median overall survival was prominently shorter than those with no malnutrition [6.6 moths (95 %CI, 5.6-7.6) vs 11.9 moths (95 % CI, 11.1-12.7) respectively, p<0.001]. Conclusions: Our study showed that moderate/severe malnutrition in mCRC patients was associated with decreased overall survival and increased chemotherapy toxicity.


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