EVALUATION OF DOCETAXEL USE IN NON-SMALL CELL LUNG CANCER: REAL-WORLD HEALTH OUTCOMES

Abstract

Chemotherapy agents such as docetaxel are still used after failure of first or second-line immunotherapy. In order to establish the ideal choice of treatment, it is necessary to compare the efficacy and safety in the real-world setting between the available schemes. We performed a retrospective, observational study in a referral hospital including patients treated with docetaxel for non-small cell lung cancer between January 2013 and June 2017. Effectiveness variables included overall survival (OS) and progression free survival (PFS). The safety variable was the incidence of adverse events (AE). 91 patients were enrolled (84.6% men) with a mean age of 63.6 years. 21 patients were treated with a combination of docetaxel + nintedanib, and the rest with monotherapy. 79.1% of patients presented AEs of any grade and treatment had to be delayed or discontinued in 10%. The median PFS was 2.8 months (95% CI 2.3-3.3) and for OS, 6.9 months (95% CI 4.9-8.8). In adenocarcinoma patients no difference in OS was observed between monotherapy with docetaxel vs. docetaxel + nintedanib. Overall results are similar to clinical trials, but not when nintedanib is added to the therapy.