Clinical benefit of systemic treatment in patients with advanced pancreatic and gastro-intestinal neuroendocrine tumours according to ESMO-MCBS and ASCO framework

Abstract:

BackgroundAssessment of clinical benefit of systemic treatments of rare diseases including gastroenteropancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (GEP-NET) is challenging. Recently several tools have been developed to grade clinical benefit of cancer drugs. European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) has developed the ESMO Magnitude of Clinical Benefit Scale (ESMO-MCBS). The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) developed and revised the ASCO framework consisting of the Net Health Benefit (NHB) score juxtaposed against the costs of the treatment. In this review we graded systemic treatments for GEP-NET patients with both frameworks.MethodsThe electronic databases (PubMed, Embase) were searched for papers reporting comparative trials, conducted in adult GEP-NET patients in the English language. Papers were assessed according to the ESMO-MCBS and the NHB part of the ASCO revised Framework (NHB-ASCO-F) by 4 independent assessors, discrepancies were discussed.ResultsThe search yielded 32 trials of which 6 trials were eligible for grading with the ESMO-MCBS resulting in scores of 2 or 3. Eight trials were eligible for grading with the NHB-ASCO-F; resulting in scores between 37.6 and 57.4. Trials that were not primary assessable by the tools were analysed separately. Consensus between assessors was reached in 68% of trials with the ESMO-MCBS and in 23% of trials with the NHB-ASCO-F.ConclusionThe currently used systemic treatments for GEP-NET patients had low scores according to the NHB-ASCO-F and none could be graded as meaningful clinical beneficial according to the ESMO-MCBS. Despite the low incidence, the heterogeneous patient population and relatively long natural course of NET, future studies on new treatment modalities should aim for high clinical benefit outcomes.

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