Treatment outcome of docetaxel, capecitabine and cisplatin regimen for patients with refractory and relapsed nasopharyngeal carcinoma who failed previous platinum-based chemotherapy

Abstract

Objective: Although cisplatin combined with 5-fluorouracil is a common first-line regimen for advanced nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC), there are no standard regimens for refractory or relapsed patients. A study of DXD regimen [cisplatin (D), capecitabine (X) and docetaxel (D)] was conducted to evaluate the efficacy and toxicity for patients with refractory or relapsed NPC.

Methods: The regimen was administered as follows: 50 mg/m² docetaxel and 50 mg/m² cisplatin on day 1 and 800 mg/m² capecitabine on days 1 – 14, repeated every 3 – 4 weeks.

Results: Thirty patients were enrolled. The overall response and complete remission rate was 46.4 and 21.4%. Median follow-up was 24 months; median overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) were 14.0 and 8.0 months. Five-year OS and PFS rates were 14.8 and 13.3%, respectively. Four patients achieved long-term tumor-free survival (range, 53.8 – 125.3 months). Multivariate analysis demonstrated that Epstein–Barr virus DNA status (p = 0.003) and therapeutic effect (p < 0.001) were significant independent factors for OS and PFS. The main grade 3/4 toxicities included neutropenia (26.6%), anemia (13.3%) and thrombocytopenia (10.0%). There were no chemotherapy-related deaths.

Conclusion: The DXD regimen appeared to be effective and well tolerated by patients with refractory or relapsed NPC. Further investigation is warranted.

Keywords::

• capecitabine
• cisplatin
• docetaxel
• nasopharyngeal carcinoma

Acknowledgments

We thank the patients and their families for participation in this study. We also thank Xin-An, for the data collection and Yue-Li Sun for the data analysis. Y Gao and H-Q Huang contributed equally to this work.

Declaration of interest

The authors state no conflict of interest and have received no payment in preparation of this manuscript.

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