A national, multicenter, non-interventional, observational study on treatment patterns in patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma in Turkey – NOTES study

INTRODUCTION: The introduction of targeted therapies in renal cell carcinoma has significantly improved its prognosis and treatment outcomes in recent years. Such treatment options are targeted therapies of the vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) pathway and the mammalian target of the rapamycin pathway. With the use of tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) and mammalian target of the rapamycin inhibitors, overall survival has increased up to 2 years. In Turkey, due to applicable reimbursement conditions for patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC), interferon use is mandated as a first-line treatment, thus providing information on the use of everolimus only after initial interferon and second-line VEGF-targeted treatments such as VEGF-TKI. PATIENTS AND METHODS: To provide a first real-life data set in Turkey, we conducted a prospective, non-interventional, observational study and assessed the efficacy and safety of everolimus after two lines of treatment including interferon. A total of 100 patients with histologically confirmed mRCC were enrolled in the study from 11 centers between June 2012 and March 2014 (70 males and 30 females). Efficacy was assessed on the basis of progression-free survival and overall survival; safety of everolimus was assessed on the basis of adverse event occurrence. RESULTS: The study results showed that the median progression-free survival with everolimus treatment was 8.1 months (95% CI: 5.1–11.1) and the median overall survival was 17.6 months (95% CI: 10.1–25.1), thus indicating a better overall response based on survival durations than those from the randomized Phase III REnal Cell cancer treatment with Oral RAD001 given Daily study results (4.9 and 14.8 months, respectively). CONCLUSION: The study showed that everolimus treatment is a safe and effective treatment option in the treatment of mRCC after VEGF-TKI, with an acceptable safety and tolerability profile in real-life settings.