Source: Cancer  |  Posted 9 years ago

Median times to disease progression and overall response rates in patients with advanced pancreatic adenocarcinoma are significantly better with cisplatin plus gemcitabine than with gemcitabine alone.

The clinical benefit rates of the two regimens are similar but median overall survival rate seems better with the two drugs combined, report oncologists of the Gruppo Oncologico dell'italia Meridionale, based at the Oncology Institute, Bari, Italy.

They carried out a prospective, randomised Phase III trial to see if adding cisplatin to gemcitabine could improve the time to disease progression and the clinical benefit rate compared with gemcitabine alone in patients with advanced pancreatic adenocarcinoma.

The objective response rate, overall survival rate and toxicity patterns of patients in the two treatment arms were evaluated as secondary end points. Patients with measurable, locally advanced and/or metastatic pancreatic adenocarcinoma were randomised to receive gemcitabine (n=54) or a combination of gemcitabine and cisplatin (n=53).

Gemcitabine alone therapy was a weekly dose of 1000 mg/m