Q-TWiST analysis of ixabepilone in combination with capecitabine on quality of life in patients with metastatic breast cancer

Q-TWiST analysis of pembrolizumab combined with chemotherapy as first-line treatment of metastatic triple-negative breast cancer that expresses PD-L1

OBJECTIVE

In the KEYNOTE-355 (KN355) trial, pembrolizumab in combination with chemotherapy demonstrated superior efficacy and manageable safety compared with chemotherapy alone in patients with previously untreated locally recurrent inoperable and metastatic triple-negative breast cancer (mTNBC) with PD-L1 positive (Combined Positive Score [CPS]≥ 10) tumours. This study aimed to evaluate the clinical benefits and risks of pembrolizumab measured by quality-adjusted survival in the trial population.

METHODS

The study used data from the final analysis of KN355. The Quality-adjusted Time Without Symptoms of disease progression or Toxicity of treatment (Q-TWiST) analysis was used to compare treatments of pembrolizumab plus chemotherapy versus chemotherapy alone. Patients' survival time was partitioned into three health states - toxicity before disease progression (TOX), time without symptoms or toxicity before disease progression (TWiST), and relapse (REL). Utilities for these health states were estimated using EuroQol-5 Dimensions, 3 Levels (EQ-5D-3L) data collected in KN355. Q-TWiST was derived as the utility-weighted sum of the mean health state durations.

RESULTS

Patients randomised to pembrolizumab plus chemotherapy had 3.7 months greater Q-TWiST (relative gain of 18%; P = 0.003) compared to those randomised to chemotherapy at the median follow-up of 44 months, and 4.3 months greater Q-TWiST (relative gain of 20%; P = 0.004) at the maximum follow-up of 52 months. The Q-TWiST gain increased with longer follow-up time.

CONCLUSIONS

Pembrolizumab plus chemotherapy was associated with statistically significant and clinically important improvement in Q-TWiST compared to chemotherapy in previously untreated PD-L1-positive mTNBC.

Statistical analysis of patient-reported outcome data in randomised controlled trials of locally advanced and metastatic breast cancer: a systematic review

Although patient-reported outcomes (PROs), such as health-related quality of life, are important endpoints in randomised controlled trials (RCTs), there is little consensus about the analysis, interpretation, and reporting of these data. We did a systematic review to assess the variability, quality, and standards of PRO data analyses in advanced breast cancer RCTs. We searched PubMed for English language articles published in peer-reviewed journals between Jan 1, 2001, and Oct 30, 2017. Eligible articles were those that reported PRO results from RCTs of adult patients with advanced breast cancer receiving anti-cancer treatments with reported sample sizes of at least 50 patients-66 RCTs met the selection criteria. Only eight (12%) RCTs reported a specific PRO research hypothesis. Heterogeneity in the statistical methods used to assess PRO data was observed, with a mixture of longitudinal and cross-sectional techniques. Not all articles addressed the problem of multiple testing. Fewer than half of RCTs (28 [42%]) reported the clinical significance of their findings. 48 (73%) did not report how missing data were handled. Our systematic review shows a need to improve standards in the analysis, interpretation, and reporting of PRO data in cancer RCTs. Lack of standardisation makes it difficult to draw robust conclusions and compare findings across trials. The Setting International Standards in the Analyzing Patient-Reported Outcomes and Quality of Life Data Consortium was set up to address this need and develop recommendations on the analysis of PRO data in RCTs.

CCR 20th anniversary commentary: BMS-247550—microtubule stabilization as successful targeted therapy

In a landmark article published in the May 1, 2001, issue of Clinical Cancer Research, Lee and colleagues reported the original preclinical studies demonstrating anticancer activity of BMS-247550 (ixabepilone) against taxane-sensitive and taxane-resistant cancers. Subsequent clinical trials established the clinical efficacy of ixabepilone, leading to its regulatory approval for the treatment of drug-resistant metastatic or locally advanced breast cancers.

Integration of PKPD relationships into benefit-risk analysis

AIM

Despite the continuous endeavour to achieve high standards in medical care through effectiveness measures, a quantitative framework for the assessment of the benefit-risk balance of new medicines is lacking prior to regulatory approval. The aim of this short review is to summarise the approaches currently available for benefit-risk assessment. In addition, we propose the use of pharmacokinetic-pharmacodynamic (PKPD) modelling as the pharmacological basis for evidence synthesis and evaluation of novel therapeutic agents.

METHODS

A comprehensive literature search has been performed using MESH terms in PubMed, in which articles describing benefit-risk assessment and modelling and simulation were identified. In parallel, a critical review of multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) is presented as a tool for characterising a drug's safety and efficacy profile.

RESULTS

A definition of benefits and risks has been proposed by the European Medicines Agency (EMA), in which qualitative and quantitative elements are included. However, in spite of the value of MCDA as a quantitative method, decisions about benefit-risk balance continue to rely on subjective expert opinion. By contrast, a model-informed approach offers the opportunity for a more comprehensive evaluation of benefit-risk balance before extensive evidence is generated in clinical practice.

CONCLUSIONS

Benefit-risk balance should be an integral part of the risk management plan and as such considered before marketing authorisation. Modelling and simulation can be incorporated into MCDA to support the evidence synthesis as well evidence generation taking into account the underlying correlations between favourable and unfavourable effects. In addition, it represents a valuable tool for the optimization of protocol design in effectiveness trials.

Survival, quality-adjusted survival, and other clinical end points in older advanced non-small-cell lung cancer patients treated with albumin-bound paclitaxel

Background:

This analysis compared the quality-adjusted survival and clinical outcomes of albumin-bound paclitaxel+carboplatin (nab-PC) vs solvent-based paclitaxel+carboplatin (sb-PC) as first-line therapy in advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) in older patients.

Methods:

Using age-based subgroup data from a randomised Phase-3 clinical trial, nab-PC and sb-PC were compared with respect to overall response rate (ORR), overall survival (OS), progression-free survival (PFS), quality of life (QoL), safety/toxicity, and quality-adjusted time without symptoms or toxicity (Q-TWiST) with ages ⩾60 and ⩾70 years as cut points.

Results:

Among patients aged ⩾60 years (N=546), nab-PC (N=265) significantly increased ORR and prolonged OS, despite a non-significant improvement in PFS, vs sb-PC (N=281). Nab-PC improved QoL and was associated with less neuropathy, arthralgia, and myalgia but resulted in more anaemia and thrombocytopenia. Nab-PC yielded significant Q-TWiST benefits (11.1 vs 9.8 months; 95% CI of gain: 0.2–2.6), with a relative Q-TWiST gain of 10.8% (ranging from 6.4% to 15.1% in threshold analysis). In the ⩾70 years age group, nab-PC showed similar, but non-significant, ORR, PFS, and Q-TWiST benefits and significantly improved OS and QoL.

Conclusion:

Nab-PC as first-line therapy in older patients with advanced NSCLC increased ORR, OS, and QoL and resulted in quality-adjusted survival gains compared with standard sb-PC.

Neurotoxicity as a prognostic factor in patients with metastatic breast cancer treated with ixabepilone as a first-line therapy

OBJECTIVE

This study is a longitudinal follow-up of metastatic breast cancer patients treated with ixabepilone as first-line chemotherapy, with the aim to evaluate the association between a mechanism-based neurotoxicity and the efficacy of ixabepilone.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

At the 2 main investigational sites of a phase II clinical trial, 50 patients previously treated with anthracycline received ixabepilone. A chart review was performed to evaluate overall survival (OS) and time to progression (TTP) and to describe the subsequent treatments.

RESULTS

The severe neurotoxicity induced by ixabepilone (38%) is correlated with a higher overall response rate to ixabepilone (79 vs. 48%; p = 0.042), a longer TTP (11.4 vs. 6.8 months; p = 0.023) and a longer OS (36.6 vs. 19.9 months; p = 0.05). After ixabepilone discontinuation, patients received a median of 4 subsequent chemotherapy lines (range 1-12). Among the 31 patients who received taxanes, neither the neurotoxicity incidence under treatment with taxanes nor the response was affected by a previous occurrence under ixabepilone treatment.

CONCLUSION

These findings suggest that neurotoxicity development under ixabepilone treatment is a predictor of treatment outcomes as well as a favorable prognostic factor. It highlights the risk-to-benefit ratio issue of ixabepilone. We noticed the possibility to treat patients with taxanes after ixabepilone without systematic recurrent neurotoxicity.

Quality-adjusted time without symptoms or toxicity (Q-TWiST): patient-reported outcome or mathematical model? A systematic review in cancer

OBJECTIVE

Successful cancer treatment is defined as an increase in overall survival and/or progression-free survival. Despite their importance, these metrics omit patient quality of life. Quality-adjusted time without symptoms or toxicity (Q-TWiST) was developed to adjust survival gained, accounting for quality of life. The purpose of this systematic review was to assess the methods reported in cancer literature to determine Q-TWiST values and how these are currently translated to the clinic.

METHODS

The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses guidelines were used to conduct a systematic review of studies indexed on MEDLINE and Web of Science through April 2013. Cancer studies that measured Q-TWiST either as a primary outcome or retrospectively and determined utility coefficients from a patient population were identified, and their methods reviewed to determine how the utility coefficient was calculated. Additionally, other relevant factors such as definitions of health states and significant findings were collected and summarized.

RESULTS

Out of 284 studies, 11 were identified that calculated patient-defined utility coefficients. Several methods to determine utility coefficients were reported, and multiple definitions of health state toxicity were applied. Of these studies, seven reported significant differences (p < 0.05) in quality-adjusted survival. No studies, however, directly discussed the clinical relevance of their findings.

CONCLUSIONS

Currently, Q-TWiST is utilized as a mathematical theory rather than a clinical tool. Standardization of terminology plus reliability and validity testing of determining both utility coefficients and time frame definitions must be performed before Q-TWiST can become clinically useful to physicians and patients alike for making treatment decisions.

Patient-reported outcomes from EMILIA, a randomized phase 3 study of trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1) versus capecitabine and lapatinib in human epidermal growth factor receptor 2-positive locally advanced or metastatic breast cancer

BACKGROUND

This report describes the results of an analysis of patient-reported outcomes from EMILIA (TDM4370g/BO21977), a randomized phase 3 study of the antibody-drug conjugate trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1) versus capecitabine and lapatinib in human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-positive locally advanced or metastatic breast cancer.

METHODS

A secondary endpoint of the EMILIA study was time to symptom worsening (time from randomization to the first documentation of a ≥ 5-point decrease from baseline) as measured by the Trial Outcome Index Physical/Functional/Breast (TOI-PFB) subset of the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-Breast questionnaire. Predefined exploratory patient-reported outcome endpoints included proportion of patients with a clinically significant improvement in symptoms (per TOI-PFB) and proportion of patients with diarrhea symptoms (per Diarrhea Assessment Scale).

RESULTS

In the T-DM1 arm, 450 of 495 patients had a baseline and ≥ 1 postbaseline TOI-PFB score versus 445 of 496 patients in the capecitabine-plus-lapatinib arm. Time to symptom worsening was delayed in the T-DM1 arm versus the capecitabine-plus-lapatinib arm (7.1 months versus 4.6 months, respectively; hazard ratio = 0.796; P = .0121). In the T-DM1 arm, 55.3% of patients developed clinically significant improvement in symptoms from baseline versus 49.4% in the capecitabine-plus-lapatinib arm (P = .0842). Although similar at baseline, the number of patients reporting diarrhea symptoms increased 1.5- to 2-fold during treatment with capecitabine and lapatinib but remained near baseline levels in the T-DM1 arm.

CONCLUSIONS

Together with the EMILIA primary data, these results support the concept that T-DM1 has greater efficacy and tolerability than capecitabine plus lapatinib, which may translate into improvements in health-related quality of life.

Which patients with metastatic breast cancer benefit from subsequent lines of treatment? An update for clinicians

The outcome of patients with metastatic breast cancer (MBC) has clearly improved over the past decades and the proportion of women living with their disease for several years is increasing. However, the usefulness of multiple lines of treatment is still debated and under evaluation. The available data from both randomized trials and large retrospective series are reviewed and discussed in order to analyze management practices, with emphasis on potential prognostic and predictive factors for clinical outcome. At present, evidence-based medicine provides some support for the use of second-line and to a lesser degree and in selected cases, third-line chemotherapy in human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) negative MBC. Beyond third-line treatment, messages from recently reported retrospective studies also suggest a clear potential gain for women receiving further therapies after disease progression, since each line can contribute to a longer survival. In HER2-positive disease, the data from observational and retrospective studies support a clinical benefit from the use of trastuzumab beyond disease progression and emerging evidences from randomized controlled trials are leading to the introduction of newer HER2-targeted therapies in multiple lines. The question 'How many lines of treatment should we give patients?' clearly needs further research through prospective, high-quality clinical trials, aiming for a better definition of factors with prognostic and predictive role. In the meantime, the 'optimal' treatment strategy should probably be to use as many therapeutic options as possible, either in sequence or combination, to keep the best efficacy/toxicity balance, considering MBC as a chronic disease.

Inconsistencies in quality of life data collection in clinical trials: a potential source of bias? Interviews with research nurses and trialists

Background

Patient-reported outcomes (PROs), such as health-related quality of life (HRQL) are increasingly used to evaluate treatment effectiveness in clinical trials, are valued by patients, and may inform important decisions in the clinical setting. It is of concern, therefore, that preliminary evidence, gained from group discussions at UK-wide Medical Research Council (MRC) quality of life training days, suggests there are inconsistent standards of HRQL data collection in trials and appropriate training and education is often lacking. Our objective was to investigate these reports, to determine if they represented isolated experiences, or were indicative of a potentially wider problem.

Methods And Findings

We undertook a qualitative study, conducting 26 semi-structured interviews with research nurses, data managers, trial coordinators and research facilitators involved in the collection and entry of HRQL data in clinical trials, across one primary care NHS trust, two secondary care NHS trusts and two clinical trials units in the UK. We used conventional content analysis to analyze and interpret our data. Our study participants reported (1) inconsistent standards in HRQL measurement, both between, and within, trials, which appeared to risk the introduction of bias; (2), difficulties in dealing with HRQL data that raised concern for the well-being of the trial participant, which in some instances led to the delivery of non-protocol driven co-interventions, (3), a frequent lack of HRQL protocol content and appropriate training and education of trial staff, and (4) that HRQL data collection could be associated with emotional and/or ethical burden.

Conclusions

Our findings suggest there are inconsistencies in the standards of HRQL data collection in some trials resulting from a general lack of HRQL-specific protocol content, training and education. These inconsistencies could lead to biased HRQL trial results. Future research should aim to develop HRQL guidelines and training programmes aimed at supporting researchers to carry out high quality data collection.

Phase II randomized study of trastuzumab emtansine versus trastuzumab plus docetaxel in patients with human epidermal growth factor receptor 2-positive metastatic breast cancer

PURPOSE

Trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1), an antibody-drug conjugate composed of the cytotoxic agent DM1 conjugated to trastuzumab via a stable thioether linker, has shown clinical activity in single-arm studies enrolling patients with human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) -positive metastatic breast cancer (MBC) whose disease had progressed on HER2-targeted therapy in the metastatic setting.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

Patients (N = 137) with HER2-positive MBC or recurrent locally advanced breast cancer were randomly assigned to trastuzumab plus docetaxel (HT; n = 70) or T-DM1 (n = 67) as first-line treatment until disease progression or unacceptable toxicity. Primary end points were investigator-assessed progression-free survival (PFS) and safety. Key secondary end points included overall survival (OS), objective response rate (ORR), duration of objective response, clinical benefit rate, and quality of life.

RESULTS

Median PFS was 9.2 months with HT and 14.2 months with T-DM1 (hazard ratio, 0.59; 95% CI, 0.36 to 0.97); median follow-up was approximately 14 months in both arms. ORR was 58.0% (95% CI, 45.5% to 69.2%) with HT and 64.2% (95% CI, 51.8% to 74.8%) with T-DM1. T-DM1 had a favorable safety profile versus HT, with fewer grade ≥ 3 adverse events (AEs; 46.4% v 90.9%), AEs leading to treatment discontinuations (7.2% v 34.8%), [corrected] and serious AEs (20.3% v 25.8%). Preliminary OS results were similar between treatment arms; median follow-up was approximately 23 months in both arms.

CONCLUSION

In this randomized phase II study, first-line treatment with T-DM1 for patients with HER2-positive MBC provided a significant improvement in PFS, with a favorable safety profile, versus HT.

Recommendations for including multiple symptoms as endpoints in cancer clinical trials: a report from the ASCPRO (Assessing the Symptoms of Cancer Using Patient-Reported Outcomes) Multisymptom Task Force

The multiple symptoms arising from cancer and its treatment impose significant distress for patients. However, in clinical research, there is no agreed-upon way of assessing and presenting the effects of treatment on multiple symptoms, as either individual scores or a composite score. The ASCPRO (Assessing the Symptoms of Cancer Using Patient-Reported Outcomes) Multisymptom Task Force was established to make recommendations about measuring multiple symptoms as outcomes in cancer clinical trials. The Multisymptom Task Force addressed how to choose the symptoms to be assessed and how multiple individual symptom scores or composite scores of several symptoms might be used as clinical trial outcomes. Consensus was reached on a definition of a multisymptom outcome, the problem of source attribution, and the need for a hypothesis-driven conceptual framework to measure multisymptom outcomes. Validated single-item and multi-item measures currently available or that can be easily generated for oncology use were deemed sufficient for measuring multiple symptoms. The relative value of a composite score versus a set of individual symptom scores was discussed, along with issues in developing and deploying such a composite measure. The results indicated that more research on combining scores of different symptoms is needed. Symptom data should be a required component of cancer clinical trials. Patient-reported symptoms provide a unique patient perspective on treatment benefit and risk that goes beyond clinician-reported adverse events. A representation of changes in multiple symptoms would clarify the impact of treatment and enhance the interpretation of cancer clinical trials for clinicians, patients, and those who make health care policy.