Drug development for chronic cancers: Time to think differently?

摘要

As the treatments for epithelial cancers have inched forward, the chronic management of patients with high performance status has become a common problem in the practice of oncology. This conundrum is clearly illustrated by the excellent, yet negative, randomized trial by Colombo et al1 that accompanies this editorial. This large, well-designed clinical trial tested another modestly active agent, patu-pilone, in comparison with pegylated liposomal doxorubicin (PLD) in patients with platinum-resistant ovarian cancer. Sadly, this study did not meet its prespecified superiority end point, namely an overall survival improvement compared with the use of PLD.