Outcomes of Chemotherapy plus Cetuximab as First-line Treatment in Patients with Metastatic, Recurrent, Unresectable Head and Neck Cancers: Real-life Data

Objective: To examine the treatment outcomes of the EXTREME regimen as the first-line therapy for recurrent/metastatic squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck. Place and Duration of the Study: Department of Medical Oncology, Ankara Diskapi Yildirim Beyazit Training and Research Methodology: A total of 60 patients with recurrent/metastatic head and neck cancers were treated with EXTREME regimen. Survival curves were estimated using the Kaplan-Meier method. Cox proportional hazards regression models were used to determine the factors associated with progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS). Results: Patients receiving cetuximab in combination with chemotherapy for metastatic or unresectable disease were obtained from patient files and electronic medical records. Majority of patients were male (78.3%). The median PFS of patients was 7 months. The median survival of the patients was 9.06 months. During follow-up, 55 patients (91.7%) relapsed, and 51 patients (85%) died. The median survival of patients with eastern cooperative oncology group (ECOG) performance status 0, 1, and 2 was 16, 9, and 4 months, respectively. And the survival of patients was found significantly lower with lower ECOG performance scores. Conclusion: OS was determined as 9.06 months. ECOG performance score had an important effect on the survival.