Do patients with metastatic urothelial carcinoma benefit from docetaxel as second-line chemotherapy?

To evaluate the efficacy and toxicity of docetaxel regimen as second-line after failure of a platinum-based chemotherapy.

Between May 2005 and June 2008, we retrospectively analyzed the data of 22 patients who had evidence of disease progression after one prior platinum-based regimen for metastatic urothelial carcinoma. Patients were treated with two different docetaxel dose schedules: (1) docetaxel 60 mg/m(2) every 21 days for unfit patients or (2) docetaxel 75 mg/m(2) every 21 days for fit patients.

Median number of docetaxel cycles was three. Overall disease control rate was 18 %. Of the 22 patients, no patient achieved complete or partial response and four patients had stable disease. Median progression-free survival was 1.67 months and median overall survival was 3.12 months. Neutropenia was the most common adverse event.

This study identifies that docetaxel as second-line chemotherapy has low activity and was associated with significant toxicity.