Retrospective Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2023. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastrointest Oncol. Jan 15, 2023; 15(1): 143-154
Published online Jan 15, 2023. doi: 10.4251/wjgo.v15.i1.143
Short-term efficacy and influencing factors of conventional chemotherapy combined with irinotecan in patients with advanced gastric cancer
Jun-Ping Wang, Jian-Lei Du, Ya-Ying Li
Jun-Ping Wang, Jian-Lei Du, Ya-Ying Li, Pharmacy Department, Zhumadian Central Hospital, Zhumadian 463000, Henan Province, China
Author contributions: Wang JP design the experiment; Wang JP, Du JL and Li YY drafted the work; Du JL and Li YY collected the data; Wang JP and Du JL analysed and interpreted data; Wang JP, Du JL and Li YY revised and proofed the manuscript.
Institutional review board statement: The study was reviewed and approved by the Zhumadian Central Hospital Institutional Review Board (Approval No. 2022083).
Informed consent statement: All study participants, or their legal guardian, provided informed written consent prior to study enrollment.
Conflict-of-interest statement: There is no conflict of interest.
Data sharing statement: All data and materials are available from the corresponding author.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Jun-Ping Wang, BSc, Pharmacist, Pharmacy Department, Zhumadian Central Hospital, No. 747 West Section of Zhonghua Road, Zhumadian 463000, Henan Province, China. wangjp2023@163.com
Received: November 14, 2022
Peer-review started: November 14, 2022
First decision: November 30, 2022
Revised: December 6, 2022
Accepted: December 21, 2022
Article in press: December 21, 2022
Published online: January 15, 2023
Abstract
BACKGROUND

Gastric cancer is one of the most common cancers worldwide, with a 5-year survival rate of only 20%. The age of onset of gastric cancer is in line with the general rule of cancer. Most of them occur after middle age, mostly between 40 and 60 years old, with an average age of about 50 years old, and only 5% of patients are under 30 years old. The incidence of male is higher than that of female.

AIM

To investigate the short-term efficacy and influencing factors of chemotherapy combined with irinotecan in patients with advanced gastric cancer.

METHODS

Eighty patients with advanced gastric cancer who were treated in our hospital from January 2019 to January 2022 were selected. The patients were divided into an observation group (n = 40) and control group (n = 40) by the envelope method. The control group was given preoperative routine chemotherapy. The observation group was treated with irinotecan in addition to the chemotherapy given to the control group. The short-term efficacy of treatment in the two groups, as well as tumor marker levels and quality of life before and after treatment were evaluated.

RESULTS

The short-term treatment effect in the observation group was better than that in the control group (P < 0.05), and the total effective rate was 57.50%. The age and proportion of tumor node metastasis (TNM) stage IV patients with ineffective chemotherapy in the observation group were (65.12 ± 5.71) years and 52.94%, respectively, which were notably higher than those of patients with effective chemotherapy (P < 0.05), while the Karnofsky Performance Scale score was (67.70 ± 3.83) points, which was apparently lower than that of patients with effective chemotherapy (P < 0.05). After 3 mo of treatment, the SF-36 scale scores of physiological function, energy, emotional function, and mental health in the observation group were 65.12 ± 8.14, 54.76 ± 6.70, 47.58 ± 7.22, and 66.16 ± 8.11 points, respectively, which were considerably higher than those in the control group (P < 0.05). The incidence rates of grade III-IV diarrhea and grade III-IV thrombocytopenia in the observation group were 32.50% and 25.00%, respectively, which were markedly higher than those in the control group (P < 0.05).

CONCLUSION

Chemotherapy combined with irinotecan in patients with advanced gastric cancer has a good short-term efficacy and can significantly reduce serum tumor markers and improve the quality of life of patients. The efficacy may be affected by the age and TNM stage of the patients, and its long-term efficacy needs further study.

Keywords: Advanced gastric cancer, Conventional chemotherapy, Irinotecan, Efficacy, Quality of life

Core Tip: Gastric cancer is a malignant tumor of gastric mucosal epithelial cells with early symptoms not obvious, and most patients are advanced at the stage of diagnosis. Surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy are often used in clinical treatment. Although chemotherapy is one of the main treatment options, there is no unified or standardized treatment method; therefore, it is particularly important to determine the effective treatment options for patients with advanced gastric cancer. This study explores the short-term efficacy and influencing factors of irinotecan combined with oxaliplatin and fluorouracil in patients with advanced gastric cancer.