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K. Ramchandran



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    O18 - Cancer Control and Epidemiology II (ID 133)

    • Event: WCLC 2013
    • Type: Oral Abstract Session
    • Track: Prevention & Epidemiology
    • Presentations: 1
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      O18.06 - Vietnamese non-small cell lung cancer patients in California: molecular profiles and clinical characteristics (ID 1079)

      11:25 - 11:35  |  Author(s): K. Ramchandran

      • Abstract
      • Presentation
      • Slides

      Background
      Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related deaths worldwide with 1.3 million deaths per year. Discoveries of oncogenic mutations in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) over the past decade have led to targeted therapies against epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) activating mutations, anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK) gene rearrangement, and repressor of silencing 1 (ROS1) gene rearrangement. The frequencies of these mutations and gene rearrangements have been elucidated in the Western and East Asian populations. However, the frequencies of these oncogenic alterations remain unknown in Vietnam, where lung cancer is one of the leading causes of cancer mortalities but molecular testing is not routinely performed due to limited resources. In this project, we aimed to analyze the Vietnamese patients treated at Stanford, California, with a future plan to compare with another cohort inside Vietnam.

      Methods
      We collected molecular and clinical variables of NSCLC patients of Vietnamese origin, based on patients' self-reported ethnicity, language, or country of origin, treated at Stanford from 2009 to 2012. Comparison of the molecular and clinical characteristics of never smokers versus smokers was performed with Pearson's chi-squared test for nominal variables and Student's t test for continuous variables. Survival analyses were done using the Kaplan-Meier method and Cox proportional hazards modeling.

      Results
      Forty-six patients of Vietnamese origin were seen at the Stanford thoracic oncology clinic from 2009 to 2012, including 22 men and 24 women with a mean age of 58 years. Twenty-seven (58.7%) were never-smokers. Forty-two (91.3%) of the tumors were adenocarcinoma. Ten patients (21.7%) presented at stage I, none at stage II, 8 patients (17.4%) at stage III, 28 patients (60.9%) at stage IV. Fifteen patients out of 28 tested for EGFR (53.6%) had an activating mutation; 14 of these 15 patients were never-smokers. Five patients out of 16 tested for ALK (31.3%) had ALK gene rearrangement. No ROS1 gene rearrangement out of 3 patients tested was found. Only one patient, a former smoker, out of 23 tested (4.4%) was found to have a KRAS mutation. Eighteen out of 27 never-smokers (66.7%) and 3 out of 19 smokers (15.8%) had a targetable driver mutation (EGFR, ALK, or ROS1). For all stages, the median overall survival (OS) for never-smokers was 22.3 months (95% confidence interval (CI); 11.9 months, 24.3 months) compared to 12.9 months (95% CI; 5.8 months, 20.0 months) for smokers. For only stage IV, the median OS for never-smokers was 21.2 months (95% CI; 13.0 months, 24.3 months) compared to 11.6 months (95% CI; 1.4 months, 30.9 months) for smokers.

      Conclusion
      Approximately two-thirds of never-smoker patients of Vietnamese origin had NSCLC with a targetable driver mutation. OS differ markedly by smoking status. The high percentage of Vietnamese patients in California with driver mutations warrants further studies to evaluate the frequencies of NSCLC driver mutations inside Vietnam, strongly suggesting that nationwide implementation of routine molecular testing will have a positive impact on clinical management of Vietnamese patients with NSCLC.

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    P1.24 - Poster Session 1 - Clinical Care (ID 146)

    • Event: WCLC 2013
    • Type: Poster Session
    • Track: Supportive Care
    • Presentations: 1
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      P1.24-048 - Stage 1 results of a 2-stage phase II trial of single agent amrubicin in patients with previously treated thymic malignancies (ID 3175)

      09:30 - 09:30  |  Author(s): K. Ramchandran

      • Abstract

      Background
      There are limited treatment options for patient with advanced thymic malignancies and the utility of many of the available chemotherapies is restricted by cumulative toxicity such as neuropathy (taxanes) and cardiomyopathy (anthracyclines). We designed this study to look at single agent amrubicin, a third generation anthracycline and topoisomerase II inhibitor with minimal cardiac toxicity, in patients with advanced thymic malignancies.

      Methods
      Eligible patients have confirmed thymic malignancy (thymoma (T) or thymic carcinoma (TC)) with progression or relapse after at least 1 prior chemotherapeutic regimen, and adequate organ function including left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) of >50%. The initial treatment plan consisted of amrubicin at 40 mg/m[2] IV days 1-3 repeated in 3-week cycles. The study is a Simon 2-stage design based on a null hypothesis of a true response rate <5%, with 90% power to detect a 20% true response rate and a plan to accrue 12 evaluable patients in stage 1, then if at least 1 response is seen, to add 25 additional evaluable patients in stage 2 for a total of 39 patients.

      Results
      Enrollment was initiated in July 2011. Here, we report on the first 12 patients, all enrolled at Stanford University over a 19-month period. Of the first 12 patients enrolled, 11 were dosed. All were pre-treated (5 with prior anthracycline). There were 5 women and 7 men; age range of 30-67 years old; 6 were of Asian ethnicity, 5 were non-Hispanic White and 1 was Hispanic. After enrollment of the first 8 patients, of whom 3 were hospitalized with febrile neutropenia (FN) (38%), the study was amended to a starting dose of 35 mg/m[2] days 1-3 repeated in 3-week cycles. Other than FN in the 3 patients mentioned above, G4 thrombocytopenia in 1 patient, and treatment-related G3 fatigue in 2 patients, other toxicities were generally mild and well tolerated. No significant changes in LVEF have been noted on serial echocardiograms. Of the 11 treated patients, there were 3 partial responses (2 T and 1 TC), 7 with stable disease for at least 4 cycles, and 1 with progressive disease (PD) after 2 cycles (TC). Of the 11 treated patients, only 1 patient, with PD after C2, has stopped before completing 6 cycles, and 5 to date have tolerated >10 cycles (with others still on treatment who may receive >10 cycles), with 15 cycles as the highest number to date.

      Conclusion
      Amrubicin, at 35 mg/m[2] IV days 1-3 on a 3-week cycle, shows promise as a single agent in pre-treated patients with thymoma and thymic carcinoma with a 27% RR in the first 11 treated patients. This exceeded the threshold for proceeding to step 2 and the study will now continue to a total of 39 patients and has expanded to other sites including Indiana University.