High-dose chemotherapy with peripheral blood stem cell transplantation forpatients with advanced ovarian cancer

Purpose: We report the results of high-dose chemotherapy (HDC) with periphe ral blood stem cell transplantation in twenty-one patients with primarily a dvanced or relapsed ovarian cancer. Methods: Twenty-five women underwent st em cell collection, and 21 were finally treated with different regimens of HDC containing cyclophosphamide, etoposide, carboplatin, and treosulfan. Th e patients received cyclophosphamide +/- cisplatin and cisplatin + paclitax el, respectively, followed by G-CSF (n = 24) or GM-CSF (n = 1) for stem cel l mobilization. Results: A mean of 7.2 +/- 6.1 x 10(6) CD34 + cells per kg bw were collected. Thirteen patients received double transplants and one pa tient received a triple transplant. The median age was 47 years (range 24-6 1 years) and the mean number of prior regimens was three (range 1-8). Engra ftment occurred on time in all patients and there was one treatment-related death resulting in an overall mortality rate of 4.8% among the 21 patients treated with HDC. The response rate was 72% (48% CR, 24% PR) and the mean time to progression and overall survival after HDC were 7 and 32 months, re spectively. Conclusion: HDC could be performed safely in patients with adva nced ovarian cancer. However, even with a high response rate, the duration of response is short, warranting new treatment approaches to further improv e the outcome of this population of patients with unfavorable prognosis.