Published in:
Open Access 01-12-2014 | Research article
Safety and effectiveness of vinflunine in patients with metastatic transitional cell carcinoma of the urothelial tract after failure of one platinum-based systemic therapy in clinical practice
Published in: BMC Cancer | Issue 1/2014
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Background
Patients with transitional cell carcinoma of the urothelial tract (TCCU) who fail initial platinum-based chemotherapy for advanced disease represent a challenge in daily clinical practice. Vinflunine is approved by the European Medicine Agency (EMA) but, up to now, limited experience has been reported outside clinical trials.
Methods
We assessed the efficacy and safety of vinflunine in an unselected group of 102 consecutive patients with metastatic TCCU.
Results
The median age was 67 years (range 45–83). Among the most common comorbidities that patients presented at baseline were hypertension (50.5%) and diabetes (20.7%).
Distant metastases were present in retroperitoneal nodes (58%), lung (29.3%), and bone (20.2%). The ECOG 0, 1 and 2 performance status at the start of vinflunine were 31.3%, 60.6% and 8.1%, respectively. The most commonly reported adverse events of any grade were constipation 70.6% (5.9% grade 3–4), vomiting 49.1% (2% grade 3–4), neutropenia 48.1% (12.8% grade 3–4) and abdominal pain 34.3% (4.9% grade 3–4). A median of 4 cycles of vinflunine was administered per patient (range 1–18). Median progression free and overall survival for all patients (N = 102) were 3.9 months (2.3-5.5) and 10 months (7.3-12.8), respectively. Time to tumor progression was 4.3 months (2.6-5.9). Two patients (2%) achieved CR, 23 (22.5%) patients had PR, and 42 (41.2%) presented SD as best response. The clinical benefit rate with vinflunine was 65.7%.
Conclusions
Our results show that the behavior of vinflunine in routine clinical practice resembles that of the pivotal phase III randomized study.