The efficacy and safety of osimertinib in treating nonsmall cell lung cancer: A PRISMA-compliant systematic review and meta-analysis

BACKGROUND: Epidermal growth factor receptor tyrosine kinase inhibitor (EGFR-TKI) is the primary treatment in treating with EGFR mutant nonsmall cell lung cancer (NSCLC). This systematic review and meta-analysis aimed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of the third-generation EGFR-TKI, osimertinib, and summarize the risk factors associating with outcome after osimertinib treatment. METHOD: The Ovid Medline, Embase, Cochrane Library, and Pubmed were systematically searched due to December 10, 2019. All the studies that mentioned the overall survival (OS), progression-free survival (PFS), treatment response, and adverse events (AEs) of osimertinib were involved in our study. Hazard ratio (HR) with 95% confidence intervals was used for comparing OS and PFS. RESULT: A total of 47 studies were included in the systematic review, of which 14 studies were used to compare the efficacy between osimertinib and other EGFR-TKI or chemotherapy. Patients treating with osimertinib favors a higher OS and PFS in all the patients (HR = 0.56 and 0.38, P < .001, respectively), and in subgroup analysis, compared with other treatments. Median 55% T790 mutant NSCLC patients might experience partial response, and 25% of patients remained as stable disease. The incidence of severe AE ranged from 0% to 5%, and the most common severe AE was pneumonia (3%). Patients with the T858R mutation may have a better OS than Del 19 mutation (HR = 0.55, P = .037), while patients who have a smoking history may have a higher risk of progression than never-smoker patients (HR = 1.47, P = .028). CONCLUSION: Osimertinib has an impressive antitumor activity compared with prior EGFR-TKI and chemotherapy with an acceptable response and tolerable AEs. EGFR mutation type and smoking status were the risk factors for mortality and progression in NSCLC patients.