Quality of life of patients with advanced breast cancer treated with lapatinib and capecitabine

Abstract

A randomized, open-label, phase III trial compared lapatinib and capecitabine with capecitabine monotherapyin advanced, HER2-positive breast cancer. The primary end-point was time to progression anda significant difference in favour of combination therapy has been found (median 8.4 v. 4.4 months,HR = 0.49, 95% CI 0.34–0.71; p < 0.001). However, no advantage in an overall survival has been observed.As a goal of palliative therapy is the prolongation of overall survival or the improvement of quality of life,two separate quality of life analyses of patients treated in this trial have been published. The first oneused conventional method based on FACT-B and EQ-5D questionarries — quality of life was preserved inpatients treated with lapatinib and capecitabine. The quality-adjusted time without symptoms of disease ortoxicity of treatment (Q-TWIST) method showed that combined therapy resulted in statistically significantprolongation of Q-TWIST in a comparison with capecitabine alone.