Faculty Opinions recommendation of Effect of First-Line Chemotherapy Combined With Cetuximab or Bevacizumab on Overall Survival in Patients With KRAS Wild-Type Advanced or Metastatic Colorectal Cancer: A Randomized Clinical Trial.

Purpose Our aims were to determine the correlations between progression-free survival (PFS), time to progression (TTP), and response rate (RR) with overall survival (OS) in the first-line treatment of metastatic colorectal cancer (MCRC), and to identify a potential surrogate for OS. Methods Randomized trials of first-line chemotherapy in MCRC were identified, and statistical analyses were undertaken to evaluate the correlations between the end points. Results Thirty-nine randomized controlled trials were identified containing a total of 87 treatment arms. Among trials, the nonparametric Spearman rank correlation coefficient (rs) between differences (Δ) in surrogate end points (ΔPFS, ΔTTP, and ΔRR) and ΔOS were 0.74 (95% CI, 0.47 to 0.88), 0.52 (95% CI, 0.004 to 0.81), 0.39 (95% CI, 0.08 to 0.63), respectively. The rs for ΔPFS was not significantly different from the rs ΔTTP (P = .28). Linear regression analysis was performed using hazard ratios for PFS and OS. There was a strong relationship between hazard ratios for PFS and OS; the slope of the regression line was 0.54 ± 0.10, indicating that a novel therapy producing a 10% risk reduction for PFS will yield an estimated 5.4% ± 1% risk reduction for OS. Conclusion In first-line chemotherapy trials for MCRC, improvements in PFS are strongly associated with improvements in OS. In this patient population, PFS may be an appropriate surrogate for OS. As a clinical end point, PFS offers increased statistical power at a given time of analysis and a significant lead time advantage compared with OS.

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Metastatic Colorectal Cancer Treatment to progression or Not?

Journal of Clinical Oncology ◽

10.1200/jco.2006.24.18_suppl.13511 ◽

2006 ◽

Vol 24 (18_suppl) ◽

pp. 13511-13511

Author(s):

B. Melosky ◽

C. Lohrisch ◽

C. Kollmansberger ◽

S. Gill ◽

H. Kennecke ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Colorectal Cancer ◽

Overall Survival ◽

Metastatic Colorectal Cancer ◽

Hazard Ratio ◽

Second Line ◽

First Line ◽

First Line Therapy ◽

Line Therapy ◽

Number Of Cycles ◽

Line Chemotherapy

13511 Background: Treatment until progression or planned interruption of first line chemotherapy is common in the therapy for metastatic colorectal cancer and are upon the discretion of the oncologist. A retrospective analysis was performed to determine the impact of these differing therapeutic strategies on overall survival. Methods: Eligible patients were treated between 2002 to 2004 in British Columbia. All patients received chemotherapy with both FOLFOX and FOLFIRI, either first or second line. Records were retrospectively reviewed for treatment interruption, efficacy and toxicity. Overall survival was the primary endpoint. Results: 101 patients were identified. Twenty-three patients who progressed before receiving 8 cycles of chemotherapy and 9 patients who stopped their chemotherapy due to toxicity were excluded. The remaining patients were analyzed for survival. Twenty-three patients were treated to progression of whom 6 received first line FOLFIRI and 17 received first line FOLFOX. The mean number of cycles of first line therapy was was 11.5. Forty six patients received a planned break. Of these, 21pateints received first line FOLFIRI and 25 patients received first line FOLFOX. Mean number of cycles of first line therapy was 9.7. Median survival of patients treated to progression was 16 months compared to 22 months for patients with planned break of therapy (p=0.003). The Hazard ratio was 2.3 (p=0.01) in favor of patients who had a planned break. Uni-variate and multivariate analysis showed no significance of sex, age, site (colon versus rectal), sequence and ECOG status as predictive factors. Conclusion: In this study, patients who were treated until progression with first line chemotherapy with either FOLFOX or FOLFIRI had an inferior survival. Possible explanations for the detrimental hazard ratio for patients treated to progression are decreasing reserve for second line therapy when first line therapy is prolonged and increasing resistance to 5-FU based therapy with prolonged exposure. As this is a retrospective, observational study, other variables not captured by the modeled covariates that may have influenced results. This data suggests that treating to best response and then allowing a break does not detrimentally affect survival. No significant financial relationships to disclose.

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