Dr Laskin

At the 1st ESMO-IASLC Lung Cancer Conference in Geneva last week I saw a presentation that I thought would interest this general readership. The study, presented by Dr Grossi, from Italy, is a retrospective review of 61 patients with advanced NSCLC of all subtypes treated with either Tarceva (erlotinib) or Iressa (gefitinib) in the 1st or 2nd line setting. The groups were similar, remember this was not a randomized prospective study; the median age was 65 for those receiving Tarceva and 74 for those on Iressa. About 26% of the whole group were never/former smokers.

Last week, the preliminary results of interim analysis the ESCAPE (Evaluation of Sorafenib, Carboplatin, And Paclitaxel Efficacy in NSCLC) trial were presented by Dr. Scagliotti at the 1st IASLC (International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer)-ESMO (Eurpean Society for Medical Oncology) Lung Cancer Conference in Geneva, Switzerland. This was a randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blind phase III study for patients who have not yet had chemotherapy for advanced NSCLC.

Is the grass greener?