ORLANDO, FL, USA (UroToday.com) - In the ALSYMPCA trial, radium-223 was shown to increase time to first skeletal-related event (SRE) by nearly 6 months. This result was true for patients regardless of whether or not they had previously received docetaxel. SREs are a significant morbidity for mCRPC patients as they result in hospitalization and potentially affect mobility.
In this poster presentation, the authors examined whether prior docetaxel use impacted the effect that radium-223 had on the risk for or duration of hospitalization in the ALSYMPCA trial. The authors found that hospitalization events following radium-223 administration were decreased by 31% in patients who had previously received docetaxel (1.18 vs 1.70 for placebo, HR 0.69, 95% CI 0.53-0.90, p=0.006) but not for those who had not received docetaxel. The number of hospital days per year were decreased with radium-223 administration for both those who had and had not received prior docetaxel (8.53 vs 16.51 days for placebo, p=0.002; 7.53 vs 12.11 days for placebo, p=0.03, respectively). A significantly higher rate of hospitalization and number of hospital days per year were seen after initial SRE for both those receiving radium-223 and those receiving placebo. No significant differences were demonstrated when stratifying hospitalization events and hospital days/year before and after initial SRE other than a decreased rate of hospital days/year post-SRE in patients with prior docetaxel therapy (22.9 days per year with radium-223 vs 43.42 days per year with placebo, p=0.02).
The authors concluded that radium-223 reduced health care resource utilization via decreased hospitalizations and shorter hospital stays in patients with prior docetaxel exposure, and via shorter hospital stays in patients without prior docetaxel exposure. They hypothesized that a major contributor to this finding was the delay in time to initial SRE with radium-223 administration, which occurred regardless of docetaxel status.
Presented by Paul Cislo1 and Jonathan D. Reuning-Scherer2 at the 2015 Genitourinary Cancers Symposium - "Integrating Biology Into Patient-Centric Care" - February 26 - 28, 2015 - Rosen Shingle Creek - Orlando, Florida USA
1Bayer HealthCare Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Whippany, NJ, USA; 2Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA
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Reported by Timothy Ito, MD, medical writer for UroToday.com