Annals of Oncology Advance Access published online on July 1, 2009
Annals of Oncology, doi:10.1093/annonc/mdp211
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High-dose CHOP plus etoposide (MegaCHOEP) in T-cell lymphoma: a comparative analysis of patients treated within trials of the German High-Grade Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma Study Group (DSHNHL)
1 Department of Hematology and Stem Cell Transplantation, Asklepios Hospital St Georg, Hamburg
2 Institute of Medical Informatics, Statistics and Epidemiology, University of Leipzig
3 Clinic for Oncology and Hematology, Klinikum Oldenburg
4 Department of Hematology and Oncology, University of Rostock
5 Institute of Pathology, University of Wuerzburg
6 Department of Internal Medicine I, Saarland University, Homburg/Saar, Germany
* Correspondence to: Dr M. Nickelsen, Department of Hematology and Stem Cell Transplantation, Asklepios Hospital St Georg, Lohmühlenstrasse 5, D-20099 Hamburg, Germany. Tel: +49-40-1818-85-2005; Fax:+49-40-1818-85-4226; E-mail: m.nickelsen{at}asklepios.com
Background: T-cell lymphomas (T-NHL) generally carry a poor prognosis. High-dose therapy (HDT) and autologous stem cell transplantation (ASCT) are increasingly used to treat younger patients.
Design and methods: We treated patients <61 years with high-risk aggressive lymphoma with four to six courses of dose-escalated CHOP plus etoposide (MegaCHOEP) necessitating repeated ASCT. Outcomes of patients with mature T-NHL (excluding anaplastic lymphoma kinase-positive anaplastic large cell lymphoma) and aggressive B-NHL were compared using multivariate Cox regression analysis.
Results: Compared with 84.4% of B-NHL patients, 66.7% of T-NHL patients were able to receive all treatments; the rates of progressive disease were 27.3% in T-NHL and 16.3% in B-NHL patients. At 3 years, event-free survival (EFS) and overall survival were significantly worse for T-NHL [25.9% confidence interval (CI) 10.4% to 41.4% and 44.5% CI 26.5% to 62.5%) than for B-NHL patients (60.1% CI 52.1% to 68.1%; P < 0.001 and 63.4% CI 55.4% to 71.4%; P = 0.016). In multivariate analysis, T-NHL was a strongly significant adverse risk factor for EFS (relative risk 2.2, P = 0.001).
Conclusions: MegaCHOEP for T-NHL patients was no better than other high-dose regimens and was unable to address the major problems of HDT/ASCT: neither early progressions nor early relapses were reduced. This study sheds some doubt on expectations that HDT/ASCT will significantly improve outcomes for patients with T-NHL.
autologous transplantation, MegaCHOEP, T-cell lymphoma
Received for publication February 3, 2009. Accepted for publication March 13, 2009.