Prospective observational study to evaluate the persistence of treatment with denosumab in patients with bone metastases from solid tumors in routine clinical practice: final analysis.

PURPOSE: In the integrated analysis of phase III head-to-head trials in patients with advanced solid tumors, denosumab demonstrated superiority over zoledronic acid in preventing skeletal-related events (SREs). Regular and continued drug use (persistence) is a precondition of clinical efficacy; persistence in real-life is yet undetermined for denosumab. METHODS: This was a single-arm, prospective, observational, non-interventional study in 598 patients with bone metastases from breast, prostate, lung, or other solid tumors treated with denosumab every four weeks in real-world clinical practice in Austria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, and Bulgaria. Persistence was defined as denosumab administration at ≤ 35-day intervals over 24 or 48 weeks, respectively. RESULTS: Previous SREs were found in 10.9% of patients. 62.6% were persistent over 24 weeks and 40.1% over 48 weeks. The Kaplan-Meier median (95% CI) time to non-persistence was 274.0 days (232.0, 316.0). The most frequent reason for non-persistence was delayed administration. There was a trend towards weaker analgesics over time, with approximately 60% of patients not requiring any analgesics. Serum calcium remained within the normal range throughout the study. Adjudicated osteonecrosis of the jaw was documented in three patients with an incidence per patient-year (95% CI) of 0.012 (0.004, 0.029). CONCLUSIONS: Most patients received denosumab regularly once every four weeks over 24 weeks of treatment. Non-persistence was mainly due to delayed administration. The incidence of adverse drug reactions, especially of osteonecrosis of the jaw, was in line with expectations from previous studies.

Adjuvant denosumab in postmenopausal patients with hormone receptor-positive breast cancer (ABCSG-18): disease-free survival results from a randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled, phase 3 trial.

BACKGROUND: In postmenopausal women with hormone receptor-positive, early-stage breast cancer, treatment with adjuvant aromatase inhibitors is the standard of care, but it increases risk for osteoporosis and fractures. Results from the ABCSG-18 trial showed that use of denosumab as an adjuvant to aromatase inhibitor therapy significantly reduced clinical fractures. Disease-free survival outcomes from ABCSG-18 have not yet been reported. METHODS: Postmenopausal patients with early, hormone receptor-positive, non-metastatic adenocarcinoma of the breast, who had completed their initial adjuvant treatment pathway (surgery, radiotherapy, or chemotherapy, or a combination) and were receiving adjuvant aromatase inhibitors, were enrolled at 58 trial centres in Austria and Sweden into this prospective, double-blind, placebo-controlled, phase 3 trial. With permuted block randomisation (block sizes 2 and 4, stratified by previous aromatase inhibitor use, total lumbar spine bone mineral density score at baseline, and type of centre), patients were assigned (1:1) to receive subcutaneous denosumab (60 mg) or matching placebo every 6 months during aromatase inhibitor therapy. The primary endpoint (previously reported) was the time to first clinical fracture after randomisation. The secondary endpoint reported here is disease-free survival (defined as time from randomisation to first evidence of local or distant metastasis, contralateral breast cancer, secondary carcinoma, or death from any cause) in the intention-to-treat population. This study is registered with EudraCT (number 2005-005275-15) and ClinicalTrials.gov (number NCT00556374), and is ongoing for long-term follow-up. FINDINGS: Between Dec 18, 2006, and July 22, 2013, 3425 eligible patients were enrolled and randomly assigned; 1711 to the denosumab group and 1709 to the placebo group (with five others withdrawing consent). After a median follow-up of 73 months (IQR 58-95), 240 (14·0%) patients in the denosumab and 287 (16·8%) in the placebo group had disease-free survival events. Disease-free survival was significantly improved in the denosumab group versus the placebo group (hazard ratio 0·82, 95% CI 0·69-0·98, Cox p=0·0260; descriptive analysis, without controlling for multiplicity). In the denosumab group, disease-free survival was 89·2% (95% CI 87·6-90·8) at 5 years and 80·6% (78·1-83·1) at 8 years of follow-up, compared with 87·3% (85·7-89·0) at 5 years and 77·5% (74·8-80·2) and 8 years in the placebo group. No independently adjudicated cases of osteonecrosis of the jaw or confirmed atypical femoral fractures were recorded. The total number of adverse events was similar in the denosumab group (1367 [including 521 serious] adverse events) and the placebo group (1339 [515 serious]). The most common serious adverse events were osteoarthritis (62 [3·6%] of 1709 in the denosumab group vs 58 [3·4%] of 1690 in the placebo group), meniscus injury (23 [1·3%] vs 24 [1·4%]), and cataract (16 [0·9%] vs 28 [1·7%]). One (<0·1%) treatment-related death (due to pneumonia, septic kidney failure, and cardiac decompensation) occurred in the denosumab group. INTERPRETATION: Denosumab constitutes an effective and safe adjuvant treatment for patients with postmenopausal hormone receptor-positive early breast cancer receiving aromatase inhibitor therapy. FUNDING: Amgen.

Adjuvant denosumab in breast cancer (ABCSG-18): a multicentre, randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial.

BACKGROUND: Adjuvant endocrine therapy compromises bone health in patients with breast cancer, causing osteopenia, osteoporosis, and fractures. Antiresorptive treatments such as bisphosphonates prevent and counteract these side-effects. In this trial, we aimed to investigate the effects of the anti-RANK ligand antibody denosumab in postmenopausal, aromatase inhibitor-treated patients with early-stage hormone receptor-positive breast cancer. METHODS: In this prospective, double-blind, placebo-controlled, phase 3 trial, postmenopausal patients with early hormone receptor-positive breast cancer receiving treatment with aromatase inhibitors were randomly assigned in a 1:1 ratio to receive either denosumab 60 mg or placebo administered subcutaneously every 6 months in 58 trial centres in Austria and Sweden. Patients were assigned by an interactive voice response system. The randomisation schedule used a randomly permuted block design with block sizes 2 and 4, stratified by type of hospital regarding Hologic device for DXA scans, previous aromatase inhibitor use, and baseline bone mineral density. Patients, treating physicians, investigators, data managers, and all study personnel were masked to treatment allocation. The primary endpoint was time from randomisation to first clinical fracture, analysed by intention to treat. As an additional sensitivity analysis, we also analysed the primary endpoint on the per-protocol population. Patients were treated until the prespecified number of 247 first clinical fractures was reached. This trial is ongoing (patients are in follow-up) and is registered with the European Clinical Trials Database, number 2005-005275-15, and with ClinicalTrials.gov, number NCT00556374. FINDINGS: Between Dec 18, 2006, and July 22, 2013, 3425 eligible patients were enrolled into the trial, of whom 3420 were randomly assigned to receive denosumab 60 mg (n=1711) or placebo (n=1709) subcutaneously every 6 months. Compared with the placebo group, patients in the denosumab group had a significantly delayed time to first clinical fracture (hazard ratio [HR] 0·50 [95% CI 0·39-0·65], p<0·0001). The overall lower number of fractures in the denosumab group (92) than in the placebo group (176) was similar in all patient subgroups, including in patients with a bone mineral density T-score of -1 or higher at baseline (n=1872, HR 0·44 [95% CI 0·31-0·64], p<0·0001) and in those with a bone mineral density T-score of less than -1 already at baseline (n=1548, HR 0·57 [95% CI 0·40-0·82], p=0·002). The patient incidence of adverse events in the safety analysis set (all patients who received at least one dose of study drug) did not differ between the denosumab group (1366 events, 80%) and the placebo group (1334 events, 79%), nor did the numbers of serious adverse events (521 vs 511 [30% in each group]). The main adverse events were arthralgia and other aromatase-inhibitor related symptoms; no additional toxicity from the study drug was reported. Despite proactive adjudication of every potential osteonecrosis of the jaw by an international expert panel, no cases of osteonecrosis of the jaw were reported. 93 patients (3% of the full analysis set) died during the study, of which one death (in the denosumab group) was thought to be related to the study drug. INTERPRETATION: Adjuvant denosumab 60 mg twice per year reduces the risk of clinical fractures in postmenopausal women with breast cancer receiving aromatase inhibitors, and can be administered without added toxicity. Since a main side-effect of adjuvant breast cancer treatment can be substantially reduced by the addition of denosumab, this treatment should be considered for clinical practice. FUNDING: Amgen.

Results of a prospective dose intensity and neutropenia prophylaxis evaluation programme (DIEPP) in cancer patients at risk of febrile neutropenia due to myelosuppressive chemotherapy.

OBJECTIVE: To describe the incidence of febrile neutropenia (FN) and use of pegfilgrastim in cancer patients with high overall risk of FN and to investigate the relationship between granulocyte-colony stimulating factor (G-CSF) guideline adherence and chemotherapy delivery in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) and Austria. METHODS: Dose Intensity Evaluation Program and Prophylaxis (DIEPP) was a multicentre, prospective, and observational study of adult patients with breast cancer, lymphoma, lung cancer, gastric cancer, and ovarian cancer, who received chemotherapy with pegfilgrastim support and who had an overall risk of FN ≥ 20 %. Physicians assessed patient risk factors and reported their reasons for administering pegfilgrastim. RESULTS: Patients were enrolled from 113 centres in CEE and Austria between August 2010 and July 2013, and data were analysed from 1072 patients. The most common tumour types were breast cancer (50 %) and lymphoma (24 %). FN incidence was 5 % overall. FN occurred in 3 % of patients (28/875) who received pegfilgrastim as primary prophylaxis (PP) and 13 % of patients (19/142) who received it as secondary prophylaxis (SP); 79 % of FN events in SP patients occurred in the first cycle before pegfilgrastim was administered. The three most frequently chosen reasons for using pegfilgrastim were planned chemotherapy with high FN risk, female gender, and advanced disease. Overall, 40 % of patients received > 90 % of their planned chemotherapy dose within 3 days of the planned schedule. CONCLUSION: FN incidence was relatively low with pegfilgrastim PP in patients with a physician-assessed overall FN risk of ≥ 20 %. The most important reasons for pegfilgrastim use were consistent with the investigators' risk assessment and international guidelines.