Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related death worldwide. Shorter survival has been repeatedly reported for patients of African ancestry. Multivariate analysis demonstrated that this gap could be a consequence of socio-economic disparities instead of genetic specificities. However, those results were obtained in a pre-targeted therapies era and the effect of tyrosine kinase inhibitors targeting EGFR are not known in this population.
Objective
In this French West Indies study, we report overall survival (OS) in a frequently mutated population treated for lung adenocarcinoma within an equal-access healthcare system.
Patients and Methods
Clinical, demographic, survival, and treatment data have been retrospectively assessed for all patients diagnosed with lung adenocarcinoma in the islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe between 2013 and 2015.
Results
Two hundred and forty-one patients (82% African-Caribbean) were included. EGFR mutations were detected in 37% of all tumor specimens and were associated with non-smoker status in multivariate analysis. Median OS was 16.2 months. For patients with advanced disease, median OS was 11.5 months, depending on EGFR mutation (23 vs. 8.3 months for non-mutated patients, p = 0.0012). There was no difference in survival according to ethnicity or island. In multivariate analysis, performance status (PS) and EGFR mutation were the only independent prognostic factors.
Conclusions
Despite a higher frequency of EGFR mutations in African-Caribbean patients, ethnicity was not an independent factor of OS in lung adenocarcinoma. Lower initial PS in this mainly non-smoking African-Caribbean population may explain the absence of a difference in OS.
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