EGFR Tyrosine Kinase Inhibitor Combined With Concurrent or Sequential Chemotherapy for Advanced Lung Cancer Patients of Gradual Progression After First-line EGFR-TKI Therapy: a Randomized Controlled Study

According to previous reports, when non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients with EGFR mutations gradually progressed after initial EGFR tyrosine-kinase inhibitor (TKI) treatment, continuing TKI therapy may be beneficial. We aimed to compare the efficacy of simultaneous EGFR-TKI and chemotherapy with that of sequential treatment after patients gradually progressed from first-line EGFR-TKI treatment.

Patients who had gradual progression and EGFR-T790M mutation-negative were randomly divided into two groups: in concurrent group, patients were treated with pemetrexed plus cisplatin along with the same EGFR-TKI; in sequential group, patients continued with EGFR-TKI until the disease progressed again according to the RECIST criteria, and then switched to chemotherapy. We evaluated progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) time of patients. For sequential group, PFS was PFS1 (gradual progression to discontinue EGFR-TKI) plus PFS2 (chemotherapy alone). Objective response rate (ORR), disease control rate (DCR), overall survival (OS), and safety were also evaluated.