Retrospective study of real-life outcomes with pazopanib for metastatic uterine leiomyosarcoma

Uterine leiomyosarcoma (uLMS) is an aggressive malignancy with a high risk of relapse and mortality. Pazopanib, approved in 2012, is a multi-targeted orally available small molecule tyrosine kinase inhibitor. A retrospective study at two centers in Italy investigated real-life outcomes with pazopanib for heavily pretreated, metastatic uLMS. Among 38 patients, partial response was seen in 6 (17%) and stable disease in 15 (39.5) for a disease control rate of 55.2%. The median progression-free survival was 4.0 months (95% CI 2.9-6.9) and the median overall survival was 19.8 months (10.3-25.4). Grade 3 hepatic toxicities, diarrhea, hypertension, nausea, and vomiting each were seen in 5% of patients. There were no grade 4 or 5 adverse events. Two patients (5.2%) discontinued pazopanib due to adverse events. The authors conclude that among patients with heavily pretreated, metastatic uLMS, pazopanib in everyday clinical practice was safe and showed good disease control.