A phase II study of nab-paclitaxel plus carboplatin in combination with thoracic radiation in patients with locally advanced non-small-cell lung cancer

We investigated the efficacy and safety of albumin-bound paclitaxel (nab-ptx) and carboplatin (cbdca) with concurrent radiotherapy for unresectable locally advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (nsclc). patients with stage iii nsclc and an eastern cooperative oncology group performance status of 0 or 1 were eligible. concurrent chemoradiotherapy consisted of weekly administration of nab-ptx (40 mg/m2) plus cbdca (area under the plasma concentration time curve (auc) 2) and thoracic radiotherapy (60 gy/30 fractions) for a total of 6 weeks. after concurrent chemoradiotherapy,patients received an additional two cycles of consolidation phase chemotherapy that consisted of 4-week cycles of nab-ptx (100 mg/m2 on days 1,8 and 15)/cbdca (auc 5 mg/ml/min on day 1). response was evaluated in accordance with the response evaluation criteria in solid tumors. progression-free survival and overall survival were estimated using the kaplan-meier method. toxicity was graded using the national cancer institute common terminology criteria for adverse events. a total of 10 patients were enrolled in this trial between september 2013 and january 2014 from three institutes. the overall response rate was 40.0% and the median progression-free survival was 6.7 months. treatment-related death occurred in two patients. grade 2 or worse severe radiation pneumonitis was observed in all three patients that had the volume of lung receiving at least 20 gy (v20) >30%. the results of this study indicate that no further investigation is warranted into nab-ptx and cbdca with concurrent thoracic radiation for stage iii nsclc with v20 > 30% due to severe toxicity. © 2015 the author 2015.