Efficacy, safety, and prognostic factors of anlotinib treatment in advanced non-small cell lung cancer patients

Objective: This study aimed to evaluate the treatment response, survival profiles, prognostic factors and adverse events of anlotinib in treating advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients. Materials and Methods: Totally, 158 advanced NSCLC patients were included in this retrospective study. All patients received anlotinib treatment until disease progression or intolerance: Administrated orally 12 mg/d for 2 weeks then discontinued for 1 week (3 weeks as a treatment cycle). Furthermore, treatment response, adverse events, and survivals were evaluated. Results: After 2 treatment cycles, no (0%) patients achieved complete response (CR), 7 (5.0%) patients achieved partial response (PR), 112 (80.0%) patients achieved standard deviation (SD), and 21 (15.0%) patients achieved progressive disease (PD), resulting in objective response rate (ORR) of 5.0% and disease control rate (DCR) of 85.0%. After 4 treatment cycles, no (0%) patients achieved CR, 3 (4.3%) patients achieved PR, 51 (74.0%) patients achieved SD, and 15 (21.7%) patients achieved PD, resulting in ORR of 4.3% and DCR of 78.3%. For survivals, the median progression-free (PFS) was 3.7 months (95% confidence interval [CI]: 2.7-4.7 months), and the median overall survival (OS) was 12.4 months (95% CI: 9.4-15.3 months). Subsequently, multivariate Cox's regression analyses illuminate that histological type (adenosquamous carcinoma vs. adenocarcinoma) and other mutation apart from epidermal growth factor receptor independently predicted shorter PFS; meanwhile, history of smoke and brain metastases independently predicted decreased OS. Regarding safety, most of the adverse events were at mild grade. Conclusion: Anlotinib displays good efficacy and well-tolerant safety profiles in the treatment of advanced NSCLC patients.