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Significant Clinical Benefit Seen with Gefitinib in Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer: Presented at WCLC

By Patrice Olson

VANCOUVER, BC -- August 21, 2003 -- Gefitinib (Iressa, ZD18) is showing significant clinical benefit for the treatment of advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), US investigators report.

Dr. Pasi Janne, Dana Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, Massachusetts, and colleagues recruited patients with stage IIIB/IV NSCLC who were ineligible for other systemic therapies. Patients were then enrolled in the compassionate use program for gefitinib treatment.

Patients previously had a median of two chemotherapy regimens, and had a median performance status (PS) of 1. Findings were presented during the 10^th World Conference on Lung Cancer, held here Aug. 10^th-14^th.

Out of 172 patients who received treatment with gefitinib, 11 died shortly after from their disease. Another seven patients achieved a partial response. All responders were women, and all had adenocarcinoma, the authors noted, while four out of the seven responders had bronchioalveolar cell carcinoma. Disease stabilized in another 60 patient, or 35% of the group overall.

Median survival for all patients was 4.5 months, and 29% of the group were still alive at 1 year. Out of 156 patients who were evaluable for toxicity, 4.5% developed grade 3 toxicity, and 0.6% patient developed grade 4 toxicity. T the authors noted that women responded better to gefitinib than men, with a longer median overall survival of 5 months, compared to 4 months for men.

Approximately 28% of women and 18% of men who were treated with gefitinib were alive at 1 year.

The authors also observed that patients who achieved either a partial response or disease stabilization were more likely to develop a skin rash, and that patients were more likely to survive if they developed any grade of skin toxicity compared to patients who did not develop skin toxicity.


[Study title: Clinical benefits in patients with advanced NSCLC treated with gefitinib (Iressa, ZD 1839) in the compassionate use program. Abstract 0-243]

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