Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
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Query: UMLS:C0038362 (stomatitis)
 8,852 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Although recent trials have raised concerns about the toxicity of raltitrexed monotherapy in patients with advanced colorectal cancer (aCRC), similar concerns have also been raised with other chemotherapy regimens in aCRC. The lessons learnt form our previous experiences with raltitrexed are, therefore, still important as they offer practical guidances to optimise tolerability of chemotherapy for CRC in general. The aims of the study were to report the low-toxicity profile in 58 patients receiving raltitrexed when a rigorous patient information and education strategy was implemented together with an intensive supportive adjuvant drugs regimen from the start. After a discussion with the consultant, all patients received a further consultation with a specialist nurse, a series of bespoke information tools, including an information video and written guidelines on how to avoid, prevent and deal promptly with the side-effects of raltitrexed. They all received intravenous adjuvant ondansetron and dexamethasone, then oral domperidone, ranitidine and nystatin from cycle one. The dose intensity was 98% over 307 cycles. Toxicity associated with raltitrexed comprised grade 1/2 diarrhoea (31.6% of treatment cycles), nausea (12.4%) and vomiting (8.4%), with no grade 3/4 events; grade 1/2 alopecia (17.9%); grade 1 (only) stomatitis (2.3%) and grade 1/2/3 lethargy (70.3%, only 2.3% grade 3), anaemia (14.3%, only 0.3% grade 3) and neutropenia (3.3%, only 0.3% grade 3). There were no treatment-related deaths. The low toxicity, despite high-dose intensity, suggests that intensive supportive education and drugs should have a role in the future design of regimens containing raltitrexed and other chemotherapy regimens for colorectal carcinoma.
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PMID:Lessons learned from raltitrexed--quality assurance, patient education and intensive supportive drugs to optimise tolerability. 1292 50

Colorectal cancers develop as a consequence of genomic instability. Microsatellite instability is involved in the genesis of about 15% of sporadic colorectal cancers and in most hereditary non-polyposis cancers. High frequency MSI has been associated with a favorable prognosis, however it is not clear whether this is because MSI-H tumors are inherently less aggressive or because they are more sensitive to chemotherapy. Chemotherapy with a combination of 5-fluorouracil and leukovorin or levamizole has been the standard of care for high risk stage II and stage III CRC; it is also used in stage IV CRC. Several in vitro studies have shown that colon cancer cell lines displaying MSI-H are less responsive to fluorouracil than microsatellite-stable cell lines. Human studies, all of them retrospective, yielded conflicting results. The selection of patients with CRC for 5-FU treatment has been based so far on the stage of the tumor rather than the biology of the tumor. Although surgical staging is highly predictive of survival, there are indications that the form of genomic instability within a patient's colorectal tumor has clinical implications, with and without 5-FU treatment. This review suggests that patients with MSI-H colorectal tumors may not benefit from 5-FU-based chemotherapy and can avoid its potential side effects (nausea, diarrhea, stomatitis, dermatitis, alopecia, and neurologic symptoms) that occur in half the treated patients. If confirmed by future prospective randomized controlled studies, these findings would indicate that microsatellite-instability testing should be conducted routinely and the results used to direct rational adjuvant chemotherapy in colon cancer.
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PMID:Biologic behavior of microsatellite-unstable colorectal cancer and treatment with 5-fluorouracil. 1610 79