Objective: To compare estimated survival times of patients who had received maintenance monotherapy with gemcitabine (GEM), or an immuno-oncology (IO) drug (i.e., pembrolizumab or avelumab) or both therapies (one after the other) following platinum-based combination chemotherapy for metastatic urothelial carcinoma (UC) in a real-world setting.
Methods: For this retrospective study, we included consecutive patients with metastatic UC who had received first-line platinum-based chemotherapy followed by second-line treatment at our centre from March 2008 to June 2020.
Results: Of the 74 patients identified, 58 had received monotherapy as second line treatment, and 16 had received combination chemotherapy (i.e., non-monotherapy). The estimated median duration of survival was significantly longer in the monotherapy group compared with the non-monotherapy group (29 vs 7 months). Multivariate analysis showed that the outcome of the first-line chemotherapy treatment was the most important prognostic factor for survival. There was no significant difference in survival times between monotherapy with GEM or IO drugs. In addition, survival was significantly prolonged when GEM therapy was administered following IO drugs compared with GEM therapy alone.
Conclusion: Monotherapy following primary chemotherapy for advanced UC significantly prolonged survival times, and IO drug therapy remained effective when followed by GEM single agent maintenance therapy.
Keywords: Urothelial cancer; gemcitabine; immune-oncology; monotherapy; second-line treatment.