Prediction of veristrat test in first-line therapy of pemetrexed based regimen for advanced lung adenocarcinoma patients

Abstract

Background: Although advanced non-squamous non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients have significantly better survival outcome on pemetrexed based treatment, a subset of patients still show intrinsic resistance and progress rapidly. Therefore we aim to use a blood-based protein signature (VeriStrat, VS) to analyze whether VS could identify the subset of patients who had poor efficacy on pemetrexed therapy. Methods: This study retrospectively analyzed 72 advanced lung adenocarcinoma patients who received first-line pemetrexed/platinum or combined with bevacizumab treatment. Results: Plasma samples from these patients were analyzed using VS and classified as Good (VS-G) or Poor (VS-P) group. The relationship between efficacy and VS status was further investigated. Of 72 patients included in this study, 35 (48.6%) were treated with pemetrexed plus platinum and 37 (51.4%) were treated with pemetrexed/platinum combined with bevacuzumab. Among all patients, 60 (83.3%) and 12 (16.7%) patients were classified as VS-G and VS-P, respectively. VS-G patients had significantly better median progression free survival (PFS) (Unreached vs. 4.2 months; P＜0.001) than VS-P patients. Besides, partial response (PR) rate was higher in VS-G than that in VS-P group (46.7% vs 25.0%, P=0.212). Subgroup analysis showed that PFS was also significantly longer in the VS-G than that in VS-P group no matter for patients received chemotherapy alone or chemotherapy plus bevacizumab.Conclusions: Our study indicates that VS could be considered as a novel and valid method to predicit efficacy of pemetrexed based therapy and identify a subset of advanced lung adenocarcinoma patients who have intrinsic resistance to pemetrexed based regimen.