Kinetics of CA19-9 decline in a randomized phase III study of irinotecan liposome injection, oxaliplatin, 5-fluorouracial/leucovorin (NALIRIFOX) or nab-paclitaxel plus gemcitabine (GEM+NABP) in patients who have not previously received chemotherapy for metastatic adenocarcinoma of the pancreas (NAPOLI 3).

Abstract

687 Background: The NAPOLI 3 study (NCT04083235, N = 770) reported that NALIRIFOX improved overall survival (OS) vs Gem+NabP with manageable toxicity in 1L treatment of metastatic pancreatic adenocarcinoma. We explored changes in CA19-9 levels and their potential associations with efficacy as an important tumor marker in pancreatic adenocarcinoma. Methods: In NAPOLI 3, CA19-9 was evaluated at baseline and every 8 weeks until patients discontinued study treatment. The detection limit of CA19-9 was 8000 kU/L in this study. The Cox proportional hazards regression and logistic regression were employed to investigate the relationship between CA19-9 decrease and OS, progression-free survival (PFS), and overall response rate (ORR). Results: Patients with evaluable CA19-9 (levels =< 8000) at baseline and additional measurements at weeks 8 and 16 were included in the analysis (NALIRIFOX, n = 179; Gem+NabP, n = 194). The median baseline CA19-9 level was 378.0 and 409.7 kU/L for the NALIRIFOX and Gem+NabP arms, respectively. Overall, patients with (vs without) any CA 19-9 decrease by week 16 had a higher ORR (59.9% vs 35.2%; p = 0.002), a longer median PFS (9.2 vs 6.2 months; p < 0.001) and a longer median OS (14.2 vs 8.7 months; p = 0.005), respectively in a pooled analysis of the treatments. In the NALIRIFOX arm, patients with any CA19-9 decrease by week 16 had a higher confirmed ORR of 65.1% compared with those without at 42.4% ( p < 0.001), a median PFS of 9.5 vs 7.1 months ( p < 0.001) and a median OS of 15.4 versus 8.4 months ( p = 0.004), respectively. In the Gem+NabP arm, patients with CA19-9 decrease by week 16 had a higher ORR of 55.5% compared with those without at 23.8% ( p = 0.012), a median PFS of 7.6 versus 5.8 months ( p < 0.001) and a median OS of 13.7 versus 11.9 months ( p = 0.235), respectively. Conclusions: CA19-9 decrease by week 16 has the potential to be an early prognostic factor for OS, PFS and ORR. The results should be interpreted with caution as a considerable percentage of patients were excluded due to non-evaluable CA19-9 that exceeded the lab detection limit of 8000 kU/L. Clinical trial information: NCT04083235 .