Docetaxel for the treatment of prostate cancer

Prostate cancer accounts for 12% of male cancer deaths, amounting to almost 10,000 deaths per year in the UK. Patients that develop metastatic disease may have their prostate cancer controlled for approximately 2 years with androgen deprivation but invariably progress to a castrate-independent state and succumb to metastatic disease. The previous experience of cytotoxic chemotherapy in hormone-refractory prostate cancer has yielded modest improvements in quality of life, with mitoxantrone in widest use. However, following encouraging Phase II data, two Phase III trials have demonstrated a survival advantage associated with the use of the synthetic taxoid cytotoxic docetaxel (Taxotere) over mitoxantrone and prednisolone. Moreover, this treatment was well tolerated. Therefore, docetaxel is set to be the standard by which future interventions are judged and a platform for future trials containing novel molecular therapies.