Home > Focus Areas > Breast Cancer Connect > Post
  • Saved

3yr
Infectious complications of cyclin-dependent kinases 4 and 6 inhibitors in patients with hormone-receptor-positive metastatic breast cancer: a systematic review and meta-analysis - Supportive Care in Cancer

Infectious complications of cyclin-dependent kinases 4 and 6 inhibitors in patients with hormone-receptor-positive metastatic breast cancer: a systematic review and meta-analysis - Supportive Care in Cancer

Source : https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00520-022-07320-y

Aim The combination of cyclin-dependent kinase 4 and 6 (CDK 4/6) inhibitors plus endocrine therapy (ET) improved the survival outcomes and became the standard of care in the treatment of metastatic hormone-positive breast cancer. However, these combinations increased the risk of neutropenia compared with ET alone.


Conclusion: In this meta-analysis, we observed that adding CDK4/6 inhibitors to ET significantly increased the risk of all grade, grade 3 or higher infections, and urinary tract infections. We propose that closer follow-up for infections should be considered for metastatic breast cancer patients using CDK 4/6 inhibitors. This may help clinicians to recognize infections earlier which prevents early death from infection.

  • 3yr
    Interesting to see meta-analysis data from the major ribociclib, palbociclib, and abemaciclib trials regarding grade 3 or higher infections. We know that these agents cause neutropenia, but infections are much lower than in trials of cytotoxic chemotherapy. An interesting piece of information, and certainly supports the need for routine WBC monitoring, but the authors propose "closer follow up" for infections--which translates in my mind to "low threshold for infectious workup in the setting of symptoms".