Incidence, risk factors, and outcome of advanced NSCLC patients receiving antiangiogenic therapy with thromboembolic events: a retrospective cohort study

Abstract

Abstract Background Antiangiogenic therapy is widely used in advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients. The purpose of this study was to investigate the incidence, risk factors, and outcome of advanced NSCLC patients receiving antiangiogenic therapy with thromboembolic events (TE). Methods This was a retrospective study, which included advanced NSCLC patients receiving antiangiogenic therapy from March 2013 to May 2021 at Taichung Veterans General Hospital. All TE were confirmed by objective image studies. We further categorized TE into disease-related and treatment-related according to the tumor control status when TE occurred. Results A total of 427 patients were included. The overall incidence of TE was 10.1% (n = 43); among these patients, 28 (6.6%) and 15 (3.5%) patients were categorized into disease- and treatment-related TE, respectively. Multivariate analysis suggested that the use of hormone and proteinuria independently predicted a higher TE incidence among patients with disease-related TE (adjusted odds ratio [aOR] 2.79 [95% CI 1.13 = 6.92]; P = 0.027) and treatment-related TE (aOR 4.30 [95% CI 1.13–16.42]; P = 0.033), respectively. As compared with patients without TE, disease-related TE significantly predicted a shorter median overall survival (21.6 vs. 31.4 months, adjusted hazard ratio [aHR] 1.30 [95% CI 1.05–1.61]; P = 0.017), but patients with treatment-related TE had comparable survival time (32.7 vs. 31.4 months; aHR 1.05 [95% CI 0.57–1.61]; P = 0.876). Conclusion Patients receiving antiangiogenic therapy with TE should be further differentiated whether it is treatment- or disease-related, because the two groups had different risk factors and influences on outcome.