Mary McCormack, MD, University College London Hospital, United Kingdom, discusses results from the phase 3 GCIG INTERLACE study comparing the addition of induction chemotherapy to standard-of-care chemoradiation among patients with advanced cervical cancer.

Results demonstrated that the addition of a short course of induction chemotherapy to standard-of-care chemoradiation significantly improved progression-free and overall survival in this patient population and should be considered as a new standard-of-care option.

Dr McCormack presented these results at the 2023 ESMO Congress in Madrid, Spain.

Transcript:

Hello, my name is Mary McCormack and I'm a consultant clinical oncologist in London, United Kingdom, and my main interest is in gynecological cancers. I am attending ESMO this year to present the results of our randomized phase 3 trial in locally advanced cervical cancer.

We randomized 500 patients between the standard-of-care chemoradiation and the same standard of care preceded by 6 weeks of carboplatin and paclitaxel chemotherapy, and it was important to note that there was no gap between the chemo[therapy] and the start of the radiation. We have now been able to analyze our results.

We found that in those women that participated in the trial, in the standard-of-care arm, the usual [chemoradiation], 64% of women were alive and free of disease at 5 years in the standard-of-care, whilst in the experimental arm with the additional chemotherapy, 74% were alive without evidence of disease recurrence at 5 years. This is a big improvement in this progression-free survival at 5 years and I think the importance of this is that those patients who are alive without evidence of cancer at 5 years are quite likely to be cured of their disease.

Our overall survival data is also statistically significant, and we've shown that we have managed to improve on the current 5-year overall survival with locally advanced disease, which in our study was 72%, in line with what's in the published media, and with the additional 6 weeks of chemotherapy, we found that the 5-year survival is boosted to 80%. This is also a tremendous improvement, and it's probably the biggest shift that we've seen in outcome in this disease in over 20 years.

Source:

McCormack M, Gallardo Rincón D, Eminowicz G, et al. A randomised phase III trial of induction chemotherapy followed by chemoradiation compared with chemoradiation alone in locally advanced cervical cancer: The GCIG INTERLACE trial. Presented at 2023 ESMO Annual Congress; October 20-24, 2023; Madrid, Spain. Abstract LBA8.