Purpose: There is no established standard regimen for non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients with interstitial lung disease (ILD). For them, we performed a pilot study to evaluate the feasibility of chemotherapy with carboplatin and S-1, which are known as cytotoxic drug with rare development of ILD as adverse event.
Methods: A total of 21 chemotherapy-naive NSCLC patients with ILD were prospectively enrolled between March 2009 and September 2011. Every 3 weeks, carboplatin at a dose of AUC 5 on day 1 and S-1 at a dose of 80 mg/m2 daily for 14 days were administered.
Results: The median age at initiating chemotherapy was 67. Histological examination revealed 10 patients (48 %) with adenocarcinoma. Before chemotherapy, partial pressure of arterial O2 (PaO2) was low with a median of 71 Torr on room air. The median number of cycles administered was four, and the overall response rate and disease control rate were 33 and 67 %, respectively. At the time of data cut-off, all patients were deceased. The median progression-free survival (PFS) and median overall survival (OS) periods were 4.2 and 9.7 months. There was no significant difference of PFS and OS according to tumor histology. Acute exacerbation (AE) of ILD following S-1 plus carboplatin occurred in two patients (10 %, 2/21) within first course treatment. However, they were successfully managed with steroid therapy and survived for 7.0 and 8.8 months, respectively, after AE-ILD development.
Conclusions: This is the first prospective study to evaluate the safety and efficacy of S-1 plus carboplatin treatment for NSCLC patients with ILD. This regimen could be a feasible option for NSCLC patients with ILD, regardless of tumor histology. Our results would support to carry out a large-scale clinical trial to confirm the feasibility of this regimen.
Keywords: Acute exacerbation; Carboplatin; Interstitial lung disease; Non-small cell lung cancer; S-1.