PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of 177Lu-EDTMP for pain palliation in patients with bone metastases from castration-resistant prostate and breast cancer.
The secondary objective was to compare low-dose and high-dose 177Lu-EDTMP in bone pain palliation.
METHODS: Included in the study were 44 patients with documented breast carcinoma (12 patients; age 47 ± 13 years) or castration-resistant prostate carcinoma (32 patients; age 66 ± 9 years) and skeletal metastases. Patients were randomized into two equal groups treated with 177Lu-EDTMP intravenously at a dose of 1,295 MBq (group A) or 2,590 MBq (group B). Pain palliation was evaluated using a visual analogue score (VAS), analgesic score (AS) and Karnofsky performance score (KPS) up to 16 weeks. Toxicity was assessed in terms of haematological and renal parameters.
RESULTS: The overall response rate (in all 44 patients) was 86 %. Complete, partial and minimal responses were seen in 6 patients (13 %), 21 patients (48 %) and 11 patients (25 %), respectively. A favourable response was seen in 27 patients (84 %) with prostate cancer and in 11 patients (92 %) with breast cancer. There was a progressive decrease in the VAS from baseline up to 4 weeks (p < 0.05). Also, AS decreased significantly from 1.8 ± 0.7 to 1.2 ± 0.9 (p < 0.0001). There was an improvement in quality of life of the patients as reflected by an increase in mean KPS from 56 ± 5 to 75 ± 7 (p < 0.0001). The overall response rate in group A was 77 % compared to 95 % in group B (p = 0.188). There was a significant decrease in VAS and AS accompanied by an increase in KPS in both groups. Nonserious haematological toxicity (grade I/II) was observed in 15 patients (34 %) and serious toxicity (grade III/IV) occurred in 10 patients (23 %). There was no statistically significant difference in haematological toxicity between the groups.
CONCLUSION: 177Lu-EDTMP was found to be a safe and effective radiopharmaceutical for bone pain palliation in patients with metastatic prostate and breast carcinoma. There were no differences in efficacy or toxicity between patients receiving low-dose and high-dose 177Lu-EDTMP.
Written by:
Agarwal KK, Singla S, Arora G, Bal C. Are you the author?
Department of Nuclear Medicine, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Ansari Nagar, New Delhi, 110029, India.
Reference: Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging. 2014 Jul 29. Epub ahead of print.
doi: 10.1007/s00259-014-2862-z
PubMed Abstract
PMID: 25070686
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