A remarkable response to pazopanib, despite recurrent liver toxicity, in a patient with a high grade endometrial stromal sarcoma, a case report

BACKGROUND: Pazopanib is an oral tyrosine kinase inhibitor registered for metastatic renal cell carcinoma and soft tissue sarcoma. Liver toxicity is a common side effect for this class of agents. The current opinion is that in case of severe liver toxicity pazopanib should be interrupted and restarted at a lower dose after returning to Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE) grade 1. After recurrence of liver toxicity at the lower dose it is advised to permanently stop pazopanib. We describe a patient with an YWHAE-FAM22 translocated endometrial stromal sarcoma with a remarkable response to pazopanib despite recurrent liver toxicity. CASE PRESENTATION: A 40 year old woman was diagnosed with metastatic YWHAE-FAM22 translocated endometrial stromal sarcoma. She was treated successively with doxorubicin, megestrol acetate and anastrozole, before pazopanib was initiated. Several dose interruptions and reductions were necessary due to liver toxicity, but nevertheless she had a good partial response. Seven months after the start, pazopanib was permanently stopped because of a bilateral pneumothorax. Nine months later it was reinitiated because of progression and was continued for another 8 months until final disease progression. CONCLUSION: In contrast to the current summary of product characteristics of pazopanib, the drug was successfully continued despite recurrent liver toxicity, and no further liver function deterioration was found. This case suggests that further dose reductions are good practice when liver toxicity limits treatment in responding patients. Secondly, this patient with rare YWHAE-FAM22 translocated endometrial stromal sarcoma showed a remarkable response to VEGFR/KIT inhibitor pazopanib. Recently, it was reported that this specific subtype of endometrial stromal sarcoma overexpresses CD117, but has no KIT mutations. This case illustrates that (a) pazopanib can be continued in patients with recurrent liver toxicity after dose reductions under strict surveillance and that (b) pazopanib shows good efficacy in YWHAE-FAM22 translocated endometrial stromal sarcoma.