Hopes and failures in front-line ovarian cancer therapy

Abstract

Through the last three decades, the combination of paclitaxel and carboplatin remains the standard of care chemotherapy in newly diagnosed epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC). Based on a single trial, first-line maintenance therapy with angiogenesis inhibitor bevacizumab was approved in Europe and widely applied. In 2018, based on a second trial bevacizumab was approved for first-line maintenance in the United States. Despite complete remission upon chemotherapy, the majority of the patients recur. A large number of randomized trials were conducted to explore the optimal front-line therapy regimen, but neither dose-densing, nor adding of a third chemotherapy agent or intraperitoneal administration could improve overall survival (OS). Also implementation of hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC) or the neoadjuvant approach failed to improve OS. Recently, maintenance therapy with PARP inhibitors showed encouraging results in patients with BRCA1/2 mutation. Further trials with targeted therapies are ongoing. Here we review the achievements of front-line therapy in primary advanced EOC through the last three decades and discuss future treatment strategies.

Keywords: Front-line therapy; Maintenance; Ovarian cancer; Overall survival; Systemic therapy.