Safety and effectiveness of vinflunine in patients with metastatic transitional cell carcinoma of the urothelial tract after failure of one platinum-based systemic therapy in clinical practice

BACKGROUND: Patients with transitional cell carcinoma of the urothelial tract (TCCU) who fail initial platinum-based chemotherapy for advanced disease represent a challenge in daily clinical practice. Vinflunine is approved by the European Medicine Agency (EMA) but, up to now, limited experience has been reported outside clinical trials. METHODS: We assessed the efficacy and safety of vinflunine in an unselected group of 102 consecutive patients with metastatic TCCU. RESULTS: The median age was 67 years (range 45–83). Among the most common comorbidities that patients presented at baseline were hypertension (50.5%) and diabetes (20.7%). Distant metastases were present in retroperitoneal nodes (58%), lung (29.3%), and bone (20.2%). The ECOG 0, 1 and 2 performance status at the start of vinflunine were 31.3%, 60.6% and 8.1%, respectively. The most commonly reported adverse events of any grade were constipation 70.6% (5.9% grade 3–4), vomiting 49.1% (2% grade 3–4), neutropenia 48.1% (12.8% grade 3–4) and abdominal pain 34.3% (4.9% grade 3–4). A median of 4 cycles of vinflunine was administered per patient (range 1–18). Median progression free and overall survival for all patients (N = 102) were 3.9 months (2.3-5.5) and 10 months (7.3-12.8), respectively. Time to tumor progression was 4.3 months (2.6-5.9). Two patients (2%) achieved CR, 23 (22.5%) patients had PR, and 42 (41.2%) presented SD as best response. The clinical benefit rate with vinflunine was 65.7%. CONCLUSIONS: Our results show that the behavior of vinflunine in routine clinical practice resembles that of the pivotal phase III randomized study.