Treatment patterns and outcomes among patients with recurrent/metastatic squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck.

Treatment patterns and outcomes among patients with recurrent/metastatic squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck.

Future Oncol. 2018 Dec 04;:

Authors: Nadler E, Joo S, Boyd M, Black-Shinn J, Chirovsky D

Abstract
AIM: Cetuximab was approved in 2008 for treating recurrent/metastatic (R/M) head-and-neck squamous-cell carcinoma (HNSCC), and this study assessed the utilization of cetuximab for R/M-HNSCC in a real-world setting.
MATERIALS & METHODS: Adult patients with R/M-HNSCC, who initiated systemic therapy between 1 September 2011 and  31 December 2014 and followed through 31 December 2015, were identified from iKnowMed electronic-health-records database (McKesson Specialty Health) supplemented with manual chart-abstraction.
RESULTS: For 325 R/M-HNSCC patients; median age 62 years; 82% males, 67% had oropharyngeal cancer, most common first-line (1L) regimen was platinum-based combinations (76%), of whom only 8% received platinum + cetuximab +/- 5 fluorouracil.
CONCLUSION: Despite US FDA approval and National Comprehensive Cancer Network guidelines recommending use of cetuximab for palliative treatment of R/M-HNSCC, our study demonstrates low utilization in 1L and 2L settings, underscoring the need to understand reasons for low utilization.

PMID: 30511880 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

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