Long-term follow-up results for paclitaxel and cisplatin in Advanced Ovarian Cancer

The following is an abstract of results presented at the 27th ESMO Congress.

According to new data presented, women with advanced ovarian cancer (AOC) have a 34% chance of long-term survival when treated with a combination of paclitaxel and cisplatin compared to those treated with a combination of cyclophosphamide and cisplatin, who experienced a 23% survival rate after 6.5 years of follow-up.

Two prospective, randomised Phase III trials, GOG-111 and EORTC 55931, involving 410 and 680 women respectively, showed paclitaxel and cisplatin to be superior to cyclophosphamide and cisplatin in terms of response rate, time of progression and overall survival.

These highly consistent results at median follow-up times of about 3 years led to the wide adoption of the paclitaxel and cisplatin regimen as first-line chemotherapy for AOC, with the subsequent substitution of cisplatin by carboplatin.

The data presented at the conference were an update of the survival results of the EORTC 55931 trial at a median follow-up time of 6.5 years. These results are in line with the 6.5 year long-term follow-up results of GOG-111 (27% of patients receiving paclitaxel and cisplatin were still alive, compared to 16% on the cyclophosphamide and cisplatin regimen).

For more information about Paclitaxel, see the treatment section of virtual cancer centre.

(Source: Espicom Business Intelligence, 30th October, 2002)