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Undesirable effects related to oral antineoplastic drugs: comparison between patients' internet narratives and a

Arnaud Pages1, Emmanuelle Bondon-Guitton, Jean Louis Montastruc

  • 1Service de Pharmacologie Médicale et Clinique, Centre Midi-Pyrénées de PharmacoVigilance, de Pharmacoépidémiologie et d'Informations sur le Médicament, INSERM U1027, Faculté de Médecine, CHU de Toulouse, Université de Toulouse, 37 Allées Jules Guesde, 31000, Toulouse, France.

Drug Safety
|July 17, 2014
PubMed
Abstract

Insights

Patient websites offer valuable insights into oral antineoplastic agent adverse events (AEs). These online reports, though less serious, complement traditional pharmacovigilance data for detecting AEs.

Area of Science:

  • Pharmacovigilance
  • Digital Health
  • Oncology

Background:

  • The internet is transforming health information access.
  • Oral antineoplastic (OAN) agents enable increased ambulatory cancer care.
  • Websites can serve as a data source for OAN-related adverse events (AEs).

Purpose of the Study:

  • To characterize AEs reported by patients on websites for OAN agents.
  • To compare these website-reported AEs with data from the French pharmacovigilance database (FPVD).

Main Methods:

  • Retrospective study analyzing patient-reported AEs from French website forums (2011).
  • Data collected included demographics, cancer type, drug, and AEs.
  • Comparison with OAN-induced adverse drug reactions (ADRs) in the FPVD.

Main Results:

  • 202 AEs from websites vs. 1,448 ADRs in FPVD.
  • Most cited drugs: protein kinase inhibitors and hormone antagonists.
  • Websites showed more musculoskeletal disorders (16.34% vs. 4.70%) and fewer skin disorders (13.37% vs. 22.17%) than FPVD.
  • Website AEs were less serious (4.95%) compared to FPVD ADRs (68.99%).

Conclusions:

  • Patient-shared AEs on websites are deemed relevant.
  • Website data can augment conventional pharmacovigilance for AE detection.

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