Nov 1, 2010 - Combination Chemotherapy for Elderly Mesothelioma Patients
A recent study presented at the 2010 Annual Meeting of the Amercian Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) showed that elderly patients diagnosed with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) such as mesothelioma had longer survival times and slower disease progression with combination versus single agent chemotherapy.
Malignant pleural mesothelioma, an incurable cancer that affects the lining of the lungs, is caused by exposure to asbestos. As with other lung cancers, many diagnosed with mesothelioma are elderly, 60 years or older at the time of diagnosis. Lung cancer remains the leading cause of cancer death, and every year approximately 3000 people in the United States alone die of mesothelioma.
Surgery, chemotherapy and radiation therapy are the frontline treatments for mesothelioma. Due to the ineffectiveness of these traditional methods, many clinical trials have been and are being conducted to investigate better treatment modalities. Until this study, it was believed that combination chemotherapy would be too aggressive for elderly patients and standard approach was to use only a single agent.
Researchers in France, however, conducted a Phase III clinical trial in which elderly patients underwent a double agent chemotherapy. The two drugs used in combination were paclitaxel and carboplatin. Rates of progression were cut in half while survival times nearly doubled, while the toxicity levels remained acceptable. These results suggest that even elderly mesothelioma patients would benefit from a combination versus single agent approach.
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