Publications
- « Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer
Significant Prolongation of Overall Survival in Non Small Cell Lung Cancer by Maintenance Therapy with Pemetrexed: Participation of the Central European Cooperative Oncology Group (CECOG) in the Formulation of a New Treatment Concept.
The online edition of the worldwide highly renowned magazine “The Lancet” reports in its last edition (www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(09)61497-5/abstract) that maintenance therapy with Pemetrexed after the induction of at least a stabilisation of advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC; subgroup of non-squamous histologies) by platinum-containing chemotherapy resulted in a significant improvement of overall survival: Patients without such maintenance therapy showed a median overall survival of 10,3 months, whereas patients who received maintenance therapy with pemetrexed presented with median overall survival of 15,5 months. This reflects an improvement of 53 % of the median overall survival in this disease.
The Central European Cooperative Oncology Group (CECOG) contributed substantially to the successful completion of this trial, mainly with its partners from Romania, Poland, Croatia and Bulgaria. CECOG is proud that the first author of this publication is its member Prof. Tudor Ciuleanu from Cluj-Napoca (Romania) who was honoured in this publication for his excellent achievement. Prof. Christoph Zielinski, president of CECOG: “The result of this trial shows that the earlier concept of CECOG of maintenance therapy in NSCLC developed under the authorship of Prof. Maciej Krzakowski, Prof. Matjaz Zwitter and Prof. Thomas Brodowicz was impressively substantiated by the use of pemetrexed following primary platinum-based treatment. This study has high potential to redefine state-of-the-art treatment in advanced NSCLC.”
September 21, 2009