In ALK-Rearranged Lung Cancer with Brain Metastases, Crizotinib Provides Disease Control

the Cancer Therapy Advisor take:

According to a new study published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, researchers have found that crizotinib is associated with systemic and intracranial disease control in patients with ALK-rearranged non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with brain metastases who had not been previously treated with an ALK inhibitor.

For this retrospective analysis, researchers sought to investigate the clinical benefits of crizotinib, an oral kinase inhibitor approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the treatment of patients with ALK-rearranged NSCLC, in patients with brain metastases.

Researchers included 888 patients with advanced ALK-rearranged NSCLC from clinical trials PROFILE 1005 and 1007. Of those, 275 patients had asymptomatic brain metastases, and 109 of those had received no prior brain radiotherapy as treatment.

For those previously untreated patients, results showed a 12-week systemic disease control rate of 63% (95% CI: 54 - 72) and an intracranial disease control rate of 56% (95% CI: 46 - 66) with a median intracranial time to progression of 7 months (95% CI: 6.7 - 16.4).

For the 166 patients that had received prior brain radiotherapy as treatment, the systemic disease control rate was 65% (95% CI: 57 - 72), the intracranial disease control rate was 62% (95% CI: 54 - 70), and the median intracranial time to progression was 13.2 months (95% CI: 9.9 - NR).

Researchers also found that 20% of patients without baseline metastases who developed progressive disease after crizotinib initiation were diagnosed with brain metastases.