Efficacy of concurrent single-agent chemotherapy using radiotherapy in patients with cervical cancer: a meta-analysis

Concurrent chemoradiotherapy has proven to be more effective on patients with advanced cervical cancer than radiotherapy alone. Although cisplatin has been recommended to be the standard agent in chemotherapy, it has some limitations in clinical use because of its strong side effects. Moreover, the optimal chemotherapy regimen remains unclear. A comprehensive electronic search was conducted via the Internet retrieval system to identify eligible trials. The ending points included response, overall survival (OS), local recurrent, and distant metastasis rates. Odds ratios and 95% confidence interval were calculated to compare the effects. Fifteen trials with 1142 patients were eligible. With regard to the response rate, only nedaplatin showed a significant improvement compared with cisplatin. Docetaxel, pacitaxel, fluoropyrimidine, paclitaxel liposome, and irinotecan did not show any advantages. When targeted on OS or local recurrent rate, no significant advantage was found when these single-drug regimens were compared with cisplatin. However, when aimed at distant metastasis rate, fluoropyrimidine showed a disadvantage to cisplatin, whereas others showed equal efficacy. Nedaplatin, docetaxel, pacitaxel, and fluoropyrimidine showed a better effect on reducing chemotherapy toxicity than cisplatin. Single-drug chemotherapy concurrent with radiotherapy, except for nedaplatin, may have no advantage on clinical outcomes when compared with cisplatin but showed a better effect on reducing chemotherapy toxicity, which could be used as an alternative to patients who can not tolerate the side effects of cisplatin. Nedaplatin is also effective and safe, and may be highly valuable in clinical applications.