MedWire News: Adding a bi-weekly dose of bevacizumab-an angiogenesis inhibitor-to weekly paclitaxel treatment for recurrent epithelial ovarian cancer significantly improves progression-free survival (PFS) compared with paclitaxel treatment alone, report US researchers.
Furthermore, the overall response (complete and partial) rate among 29 women treated with weekly paclitaxel-a cytotoxic mitosis-inhibiting drug-alone was lower than that seen among 41 women treated with paclitaxel plus bevacizumab, at 48 versus 63 percent.
"These data may be helpful in the design of future trials in patients that have been heavily pretreated beyond two regimens of chemotherapy," say David O'Malley and colleagues from The Ohio State University College of Medicine in Columbus.
The women on monotherapy received paclitaxel 60-70 mg/m2 on days 1, 8, 15, and 21 of a 28-day cycle, and those treated with combined therapy received an additional bevacizumab dose (10-15 mg/kg) on days 1 and 15.
PFS was significantly longer in the combined therapy group than in the monotherapy group, at 13.2 versus 6.2 months, respectively.
The researchers believe this could be a result of the complementary effects of the anti-angiogenic properties possessed by both drugs.
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