Long-term adverse reaction of sorafenib in the treatment of advanced renal cell carcinoma in 25 cases

Abstract:

Objective：To investigate the long-term adverse effects of sorafenib on patients suffering from renal cell carcinoma（RCC） and to evaluate its predictive effects on survival time of patients with RCC. Methods：The occurrence，grading and prognosis of adverse effects of 25 advanced RCC patients treated by sorafenib were recorded and their predictive effects on survival time of patients were evaluated by Kaplan-Meier estimator. Results：According to 6-59 months’ follow-up；median follow-up of 23.8 months with 25 advanced RCC patients，the adverse effects appeared in 1-8 weeks；medium follow-up of 3 weeks. The common adverse reactions were hypertension（48%），anemia（36%），fatigue（44%），diarrhea（40%），skin rash（40%），and PPE（56%）. The relatively rare adverse reactions were mostly between level Ⅰ and level Ⅱ，including weight loss，nausea，anorexia，pain，and hair loss，etc. After the symp－tomatic treatment，the symptoms of 76% patients were partly relieved or disappeared，median relieving period of 20 weeks，20% pa－tients got relatively mild adverse reaction while 4% patients got relatively severe adverse reaction. The adverse effects were relieved after reducing medicine dose. The overall survival and progression-free survival of patients with hypertension were significantly shorter than those without hypertension（P=0.005；PFS：P=0.049）. Conclusion：The adverse effect appears at early period of patients with advanced RCC when taking sorafenib and most adverse effects are acceptable in long-term medicating for patients. Hypertension might have a predictive effect on survival period of patients.