SUMMARY: ColoRectal Cancer (CRC) is the third most common cancer diagnosed in both men and women in the United States. The American Cancer Society estimates that approximately 135,430 new cases of ColoRectal Cancer will be diagnosed in the United States in 2017 and over 50,260 patients are expected to die of the disease. Adjuvant chemotherapy for patients with resected, locally advanced, node-positive (stage III) colon cancer, has been the standard of care since 1990s. Adjuvant treatment with an ELOXATIN® (Oxaliplatin) based chemotherapy regimen has been considered standard intervention since 2004, for patients with stage III colon cancer following surgical resection and has been proven to decrease the chance of recurrent disease. Chemotherapy regimens have included (FOLFOX – Leucovorin, 5-FluoroUracil, ELOXATIN®) or CAPOX/XELOX (XELODA®/Capecitabine and ELOXATIN®/Oxaliplatin), given over a period of 6 months. ELOXATIN® can however be associated with neuropathy which can be long lasting or permanent, depending on the duration of therapy. Additional toxicities with longer duration of chemotherapy include diarrhea, fatigue as well as more office visits.
The IDEA Collaboration is a prospective, pre-planned pooled analysis of 6 concurrently conducted randomized phase III trials which included 12,834 patients from 12 countries. The goal of this study was to determine if 3 months of adjuvant chemotherapy would be as effective as 6 months of therapy and would be Non Inferior. Of the enrolled patients with Stage III disease, 13% had T1-2 disease, 66% had T3 disease, and 21% had T4 tumors. Twenty eight percent (28%) of the patients had N2 disease and 40% of the patients received XELOX chemotherapy. Approximately 60% had low-risk disease (T1-3, N1) and 40% had high-risk (T4 or N2). The primary endpoint was Disease Free Survival (DFS). The median follow up was 39 months.
It was noted that a shorter 3 month course of adjuvant chemotherapy was associated with a less than 1% lower risk of recurrence at 3 years compared to the standard 6 month course of therapy (74.6% versus 75.5%). In the subset of patients considered to be at low risk of cancer recurrence (1-3 positive lymph nodes and tumor not completely penetrating through the bowel wall), there was almost no difference in the DFS between a 3-month versus 6-month course of therapy (83.1% vs 83.3%). Even though Non Inferiority was not established for the overall cohort of patients, patients with stage T1-3 N1 disease showed Non Inferiority for 3 months versus 6 month course of adjuvant therapy. Further, 3 months of XELOX adjuvant therapy was Non Inferior to 6 months of ELOXATIN® based adjuvant therapy. Grade 2 or more neurotoxicity was significantly lower for patients who received 3 months of adjuvant therapy versus 6 months (P <0.0001), regardless of the treatment regimen (17% vs 48% for FOLFOX and 15% vs 45% for XELOX, respectively).
It was concluded by the IDEA collaboration that, a risk-based approach has to be taken when making adjuvant chemotherapy recommendations for patients with stage III colon cancer. Three months of adjuvant chemotherapy is adequate for patients with T1-3, N1 disease. For patients with T4 and/or N2 disease or other high risk factors, the duration of adjuvant therapy has to be determined based on patient preference, assessment of recurrent risk and tolerability. Prospective pooled analysis of six phase III trials investigating duration of adjuvant (adjuv) oxaliplatin-based therapy (3 vs 6 months) for patients (pts) with stage III colon cancer (CC): The IDEA (International Duration Evaluation of Adjuvant chemotherapy) collaboration. Shi Q, Sobrero AF, Shields AF, et al. J Clin Oncol 35, 2017 (suppl; abstr LBA1)
