Clinical factors predicting objective response to bevacizumab-based chemotherapies in advanced and recurrent epithelial ovarian cancer.

BACKGROUND: Bevacizumab-based chemotherapies are commonly administered in the treatment of patients diagnosed with epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC). The primary aim of this study was to assess the factors that predict the objective response to bevacizumab-based therapies in cases of advanced and recurrent EOC.

METHODS: The retrospective data of 264 patients with EOC from the current study were collected between 2009 and 2022 at our clinic. Survival analyses were conducted utilizing the Kaplan-Meier method and the log-rank test. Binary logistic regression analysis was employed to assess the factors predicting the objective response.

RESULTS: A predominant subset of patients (83%) presented with serous adenocarcinoma, exhibiting a high-grade differentiation at 87%. The vast majority (80%) of the cohort experienced disease recurrence. Three-fourths of the cases received bevacizumab in combination with platinum-based doublet chemotherapy. In the multivariate analysis, clinical factors such as a disease recurrence (P=0.031), upfront tumor debulking surgery before bevacizumab (P=0.009), doublet chemotherapy (P=0.003), and the presence of malignant pleural effusion (P=0.024) emerged as significant determinants influencing the Objective Response Rate (ORR) in patients undergoing bevacizumab-based therapy. The ORR was 67.5% (N.=178), comprising 15.2% complete responses (N.=40) and 52.1% partial responses (N.=138). The median Progression-Free Survival (PFS) and Overall Survival (OS) were estimated at 10.2 months (95% CI, 8.60-11.9) and 20.1 months (95% CI, 16.0-24.2), respectively.

CONCLUSIONS: The responses to bevacizumab-based chemotherapies could be predict by the presence of malignant pleural effusion, disease recurrence, upfront tumor debulking surgery and doublet regimen of chemotherapy.