International Collaboration of Trialists on behalf of the Medical Research Council Advanced Bladder Cancer Working Party (now the National Cancer Research Institute Bladder Cancer Clinical Studies Group).
The European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer Genito-Urinary Tract Cancer Group, the Australian Bladder Cancer Study Group, the National Cancer Institute of Canada Clinical Trials Group, Finnbladder, Norwegian Bladder Cancer Study Group, and Club Urologico Espanol de Tratamiento Oncologico Group.
This article presents the long-term results of the international multicenter randomized trial that investigated the use of neoadjuvant cisplatin, methotrexate, and vinblastine (CMV) chemotherapy in patients with muscle-invasive urothelial cancer of the bladder treated by cystectomy and/or radiotherapy. Nine hundred seventy-six patients were recruited between 1989 and 1995, and median follow-up is now 8.0 years.
This was a randomized phase III trial of either no neoadjuvant chemotherapy or three cycles of CMV.
The previously reported possible survival advantage of CMV is now statistically significant at the 5% level. Results show a statistically significant 16% reduction in the risk of death (hazard ratio, 0.84; 95% CI, 0.72 to 0.99; P = .037, corresponding to an increase in 10-year survival from 30% to 36%) after CMV.
We conclude that CMV chemotherapy improves outcome as first-line adjunctive treatment for invasive bladder cancer. Two large randomized trials (by the Medical Research Council/European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer and Southwest Oncology Group) have confirmed a statistically significant and clinically relevant survival benefit, and neoadjuvant chemotherapy followed by definitive local therapy should be viewed as state of the art, as compared with cystectomy or radiotherapy alone, for deeply invasive bladder cancer.
Written by:
The members and affiliations of the writing committee are listed in the online-only Appendix. Are you the author?
Reference: J Clin Oncol. 2011 Apr 18. Epub ahead of print.
doi: 10.1200/JCO.2010.32.3139
PubMed Abstract
PMID: 21502557
UroToday.com Bladder Cancer Section