Ifosfamide and docetaxel in non-small cell lung cancer

Ifosfamide has been in use for several decades and is generally considered to be one of the most effective drugs for the treatment of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). At the same time, docetaxel is one of the new, promising drugs with high antitumor activity in various solid tumors. In NSCLC, an objective remission rate of 33% could be achieved in chemotherapy-naive patients. Currently, clinical research with docetaxel in NSCLC patients focuses on various combinations of this drug with radiotherapy and a number of different cytostatic chemicals. There are good reasons for combining docetaxel with ifosfamide. In addition to the promising antitumor activity in NSCLC displayed by both drugs, it is an advantage that docetaxel and ifosfamide have only minimal overlapping nonhematologic toxicity. Moreover, the combination seems to be well founded due to the lack of cross-resistance between docetaxel and alkylators such as ifosfamide of the oxazaphosphorine type, which have shown synergistic antitumor activity in vivo. Based on this background, two phase I studies of docetaxel and ifosfamide have been initiated.