Intraperitoneal chemotherapy for peritoneal carcinomatosis improves efficacy with acceptable safety: results of 200 cycles for 41 patients.

BACKGROUND/AIMS: To investigate the efficacy and safety of intraperitoneal (IP) chemotherapy for peritoneal carcinomatosis (PC).

METHODOLOGY

Forty-one PC patients received IP chemotherapy with carboplatin at 200 mg/m2 and docetaxel at 60 mg/m2 at 21-day intervals. Major organ functions were monitored. Changes in ascites and serum tumor markers (TM) were recorded. The primary endpoint was overall survival COS) and the secondary endpoint was adverse event (AE).

RESULTS

The patients received 200 cycles of IP chemotherapy, with a median of 5 IP chemotherapy cycles at the median duration of 5 months. The median follow-up was 19.5 months. For 25 patients with ascites, 15 cases had significant improvement, 9 had stable disease, and 1 had treatment failure. End-point events occurred in 31 patients, including 26 deaths from gastrointestinal PC with a median OS of 8.4 months (95%CI 4.6-12.2 months) and 5 deaths from other origins (median OS not reached). Multivariate analysis revealed the following independent OS-related factors: CC<1, primary tumor site, and decreases in CA125 and CEA for 2 consecutive cycles. Grade III toxicities included 16 cycles of digestive AE and 8 cycles of bone marrow suppression.

CONCLUSIONS

IP chemotherapy improves OS for PC patients with acceptable safety.