Treatment of patients with liver metastases

The presence of liver metastases is considered a very poor prognostic factor for patients with metastatic breast cancer. Liver metastases are generally considered to be less responsive to chemotherapy than metastases in other sites, and patients with liver lesions have a shorter survival duration than patients with other sites of disease. The results from five multicentre phase II studies of docetaxel (Taxotere) as a first-line treatment for metastatic breast cancer have been analysed with regard to the presence or absence of liver lesions, which were found in 39% of the 209 patients involved. Response rates to docetaxel, 100 or 75 mg/m2, were maintained in the presence of liver lesions and the median survival across all five studies was 16.4 months for all patients and 14.7 months for patients with liver lesions. Similarly, when results from 129 patients given docetaxel as a second-line treatment were analysed, the response rates and survival durations were not reduced in the 57% of patients who had liver lesions. These results indicate that the presence of liver metastases does not reduce the probability or duration of response to docetaxel as a first- or second-line treatment for advanced breast cancer.