Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-gb8f7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-28T02:33:04.719Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Estimating changes in overall survival using progression-free survival in metastatic breast and colorectal cancer

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 June 2011

Russell J. Bowater
Affiliation:
Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, Unidad Iztapalapa
Philippa E. Lilford
Affiliation:
University of Southampton
Richard J. Lilford
Affiliation:
University of Birmingham

Abstract

Objectives: In clinical trials of new cancer drugs, reliable data for progression-free survival will often become available far sooner than reliable data for overall survival. The aim of this study was to determine how many months it would be expected that any given new drug for metastatic breast or colorectal cancer will add to overall survival times given that the number of months the drug adds to progression-free survival times relative to a standard drug is roughly already known.

Methods: A literature search was conducted over Medline for randomized controlled trials (RCTs) published between January 1980 and August 2008 that assessed the effect of a drug treatment in comparison to an alternative drug treatment on patients with either metastatic breast or metastatic colorectal cancer.

Results: The literature search found 95 and 74 RCTs for metastatic breast and colorectal cancer, respectively, that satisfied the study's inclusion criteria. The results from these trials are consistent, in the case of each of these two metastatic cancers, with gains in time to disease progression being generally associated with no gains or with very slight gains or losses in post-progression survival (i.e., the time between disease progression and death).

Conclusions: It would appear that drugs for metastatic breast or colorectal cancer that extend, by a given amount, the time period between the start of treatment and disease progression (i.e., time to progression) have a strong tendency to extend, by roughly the same amount, the period between the start of treatment and death (i.e., overall survival).

Type
ASSESSMENTS
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

1. Ballman, KV, Buckner, JC, Brown, PD, et al. The relationship between six-month progression-free survival and 12-month overall survival end points for phase II trials in patients with glioblastoma multiforme. Neuro Oncol. 2007;9:2938.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
2. Bowater, RJ, Bridge, LJ, Lilford, RJ. The relationship between progression-free and post-progression survival in treating four types of metastatic cancer. Cancer Lett. 2008;262:4853.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
3. Burzykowski, T, Buyse, M, Piccart-Gebhart, MJ, et al. Evaluation of tumor response, disease control, progression-free survival, and time to progression as potential surrogate end points in metastatic breast cancer. J Clin Oncol. 2008;26:19871992.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
4. Burzykowski, T, Buyse, M, Yothers, G, Sakamoto, J, Sargent, D. Exploring and validating surrogate endpoints in colorectal cancer. Lifetime Data Anal. 2008;14:5464.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
5. Buyse, M, Burzykowski, T, Carroll, K, et al. Progression-free survival is a surrogate for survival in advanced colorectal cancer. J Clin Oncol. 2007;25:52185224.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
6. Edwards, MJ, Bonodonna, G, Valagussa, P, Gamel, JW. End points in the analysis of breast cancer survival: Relapse versus death from tumor. Surgery. 1998;124:197202.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
7. Hackshaw, A, Knight, A, Barrett-Lee, P, Leonard, R. Surrogate markers and survival in women receiving first-line combination anthracycline chemotherapy for advanced breast cancer. Br J Cancer. 2005;93:12151221.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
8. Higgins, JPT, Green, S, eds. Cochrane handbook for systematic reviews of interventions version 5.0.1 [updated September 2008]. The Cochrane Collaboration, 2008. www.cochrane-handbook.org (accessed August 2008)CrossRefGoogle Scholar
9. Johnson, KR, Ringland, C, Stokes, BJ, et al. Response rate or time to progression as predictors of survival in trials of metastatic colorectal cancer or non-small-cell lung cancer: A meta-analysis. Lancet Oncol. 2006;7:741746.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
10. Lamborn, KR, Yung, WK, Chang, SM, et al. Progression-free survival: An important end point in evaluating therapy for recurrent high-grade gliomas. Neuro Oncol. 2008;10:162170.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
11. Louvet, C, de Gramont, A, Tournigand, C, et al. Correlation between progression-free survival and response rate in patients with metastatic colorectal carcinoma. Cancer. 2001;91:20332038.3.0.CO;2-J>CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
12. Piedbois, P, Buyse, M. Endpoints and surrogate endpoints in colorectal cancer: A review of recent developments. Curr Opin Oncol. 2008;20:466471.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
13. Sargent, DJ, Wieand, HS, Haller, DG, et al. Disease-free survival versus overall survival as a primary end-point for adjuvant colon cancer studies: Individual patient data from 20,898 patients on 18 randomized trials. J Clin Oncol. 2005;23:86648670.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
14. Sherrill, B, Hirst, C, Wu, Y, Amonkar, MM, Stein, SH. Correlation between time to progression and overall survival in patients with metastatic breast cancer. In: Proceedings of the 12th Annual International Meeting of the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research, Arlington, Virginia, May 19–23, 2007.Google Scholar
15. Tang, PA, Bentzen, SM, Chen, EX, Siu, LL. Surrogate end points for median overall survival in metastatic colorectal cancer: Literature-based analysis from 39 randomized controlled trials of first-line chemotherapy. J Clin Oncol. 2007;25:45624568.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Supplementary material: File

Bowater et al. supplementary material

Supplementary tables

Download Bowater et al. supplementary material(File)
File 46.6 KB