Background/aims: The purpose of this study was to investigate the efficacy and safety of irinotecan based FOLFIRI chemotherapy as a second-line treatment after failure of FOLFOX-4 chemotherapy in patients with advanced gastric cancer.
Methods: Fifty-two patients who were pathologically diagnosed with unresectable gastric cancer and received FOLFIRI chemotherapy after failure of FOLFOX-4 chemotherapy between September 2005 and February 2012 were enrolled in this study. Data were collected by retrospectively reviewing the medical records. The response to chemotherapy was assessed every 3 cycles by World Health Organization criteria and long term survival was analyzed. The toxicities were evaluated for every course of chemotherapy according to National Cancer Institution (NCI) toxicity criteria version 3.0.
Results: Median age of the patients was 57 years. Median overall survival (OS) and time to progression (TTP) were 7.8 and 5 months, respectively. The number of patients showing complete remission, partial remission, stable disease, and progressive disease were 0 (0.0%), 9 (17.3%), 30 (57.7%), and 13 (25.0%), respectively. The overall response rate was 17.3%. During a total of 345 cycles, anemia worse than NCI toxicity grade 3 occurred in 2.9%, leukopenia in 20.3%, neutropenia in 12.2%, and thrombocytopenia in 1.5%. Patients with less organ involvement by metastasis, less than 34 U/mL of CA 19-9 and good responsiveness to third cycle of second line chemotherapy were associated with longer OS and TTP.
Conclusions: FOLFIRI chemotherapy has a modest efficacy with acceptable toxicities in patients with advanced gastric cancer as a second-line treatment. Further well-controlled studies are needed to elucidate the efficacy of FOLFIRI chemotherapy as second-line treatment in patients with advanced stomach cancer.
Keywords: Advanced gastric carcinoma; FOLFIRI protocol; FOLFOX-4 protocol; Second line chemotherapy.