Published in:
01-12-2017 | Urology - Original Paper
Survival of metastatic renal cell carcinoma patients continues to improve over time, even in targeted therapy era
Published in: International Urology and Nephrology | Issue 12/2017
Login to get accessAbstract
Objective
To examine the effect of diagnosis year, defined as contemporary (2010–2014), intermediate (2006–2009) and historical (2001–2005) on cancer-specific mortality (CSM) in patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC).
Methods
Within Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results registry (2001–2014), we identified patients with mRCC. Cumulative incidence and competing risks regression (CRR) models examined CSM, after accounting for other-cause mortality. Finally, we performed subgroup analyses according to histological subtype: clear-cell mRCC (ccmRCC) versus non-ccmRCC.
Results
We identified 15,444 patients with mRCC. Of those, 41.0, 28.7 and 30.3% were diagnosed, respectively, in the contemporary, intermediate and historical years. Of all, 47.1, 5.3 and 47.6% were, respectively, ccmRCC, non-ccmRCC and other mRCC histological variants [sarcomatoid mRCC, cyst-associated mRCC, collecting duct carcinoma and mRCC not otherwise specified (NOS)]. Overall, 24-month CSM rates were, respectively, 61.0, 63.7 and 67.3% in contemporary, intermediate and historical patients. In all patients, multivariable CRR models exhibited higher CSM in intermediate (HR 1.11; p < 0.001) and historical patients (HR 1.24; p < 0.001) than in contemporary patients. Multivariable CRR models focusing on ccmRCC yielded virtually the same results. However, multivariable CRR models focusing on non-ccmRCC showed no CSM differences according to diagnosis year (all p ≥ 0.3).
Conclusion
The introduction of new therapeutic agents resulted in CSM-free survival improvement over study time. However, this effect exclusively applies to patients with ccmRCC, but not to those with non-ccmRCC. This observation is in agreement with established efficacy of systemic therapies for ccmRCC, but lesser efficacy of these agents for non-ccmRCC.