Pemetrexed for previously treated patients with metastatic gastric cancer: a prospective phase II study

BACKGROUND: Gastric cancer is one of the leading causes of cancer-related death worldwide. There were debates on the value of the second-line and beyond chemotherapy by the time we designed this trial. So we designed this phase II trial to assess the efficacy and safety of pemetrexed in patients with pretreated metastatic gastric cancer. METHODS: Thirty-four patients with pretreated metastatic gastric cancer were enroled in the study. Patients received pemetrexed 500 mg m(−2) every 21 days until the presence of progressive disease (PD) or unacceptable toxicity. RESULTS: A total of 34 patients were enroled in the study; 34 were eligible for toxicity and 30 for response. The response rate was 13.3%, 13.3% patients achieved a partial response, 50.0% achieved stable disease and 36.7% had a PD as the best response. The median overall survival time and median progression-free survival time was 6.4 months (95% confidence interval (CI) 5.8–9.5 months) and 2.2 months (95% CI 2.0–5.5 months), respectively. Most haematologic and non-haematologic toxicity were grade 1/2. Grade 3/4 toxicity included fatigue, neutropenia, thrombocytopenia, weight loss, anorexia and transaminase elevation. CONCLUSIONS: The monochemotherapy of pemetrexed is active and well tolerated when used in previously treated patients with metastatic gastric cancer.