Pazopanib Associated With Slightly Longer Time Without Toxicity in RCC

Patients with locally advanced or metastatic renal cell carcinoma (RCC) randomly assigned to receive pazopanib had a moderately longer time without symptoms or toxicity compared with sunitinib, a study published in the journal Cancer has shown.¹

Findings from the open-label, phase 3 COMPARZ trial demonstrated that pazopanib was noninferior to sunitinib with respect to progression-free survival in treatment-naïve patients with metastatic RCC. Researchers reported results from a post-hoc analysis that evaluated overall treatment differences using quality-adjusted time without symptoms or toxicity (Q-TWiST) methodology.

For the study, participants were categorized into 1 of 3 health states: time with grade 3 or 4 toxicity, time without symptoms of disease or grade 3/4 toxicity of treatment, and time after disease progression or relapse. Researchers then calculated the Q-TWiST after weighting the time spent in each state by a health-state utility associated with that state.

Results showed that the average time with grade 3 or 4 toxicity was 31 days (95% CI, 13 – 48) longer for sunitinib compared with pazopanib. In a threshold utility analysis, researchers found that the Q-TWiST ranged from -11 days to 43 days in favor of pazopanib for most utility combinations, but significant differences typically occurred when the utility for time with grade 3 or 4 toxicity was lower than that for time after tumor progression or relapse.

“Patients randomized to pazopanib had a slightly longer Q-TWiST in comparison with sunitinib patients, and this was primarily due to the reduced length of [time with grade 3 or 4 toxicity],” the authors concluded.

Reference

1. Beaumont JL, Salsman JM, Diaz J, et al. Quality-adjusted time without symptoms or toxicity analysis of pazopanib versus sunitinib in patients with renal cell carcinoma [published online ahead of print January 27, 2016]. Cancer. doi: 10.1002/cncr.29888.