TMH had organised a three-day conference titled International Metronomic and Anti-Angiogenic Meeting, and the doctors revealed the therapy during this conference on Saturday.
The Tata Memorial hospital (TMH) has introduced a novel therapy for patients with relapsed ovarian cancer, which provides a better quality of life to patients at a much lesser cost, while boasting of same survival rate as traditional chemotherapy.
TMH had organised a three-day conference titled International Metronomic and Anti-Angiogenic Meeting, and the doctors revealed the therapy during this conference on Saturday. Metronomic chemotherapy, a relatively new branch in oncology, involves giving a continuous but low dose of medicine to the patients.
In a pilot study conducted in 2010, 26 ovarian cancer patients who had already undergone three lines of chemotherapy as per standard protocol before they relapsed, were observed. The doctors put them on a low dose of standard chemotherapeutic drugs including Etoposide, Tamoxifen and Cyclophosphamide. The patients belonged to the 32-60 years age group.
Study investigator Dr Gautam Goyal, who is currently working as oncology consultant in Chandigarh's Max hospital, said, "During the study, we found that with metronomic chemotherapy, patients need not be admitted to hospital. They have a better quality of life with lesser side effects, while the survival rate is almost the same as traditional chemotherapy. The cost of treatment is also low – while traditional chemotherapy costs Rs30,000-35,000 a month, the new therapy costs Rs2,000 a month."
He added, "As per standard protocol chemotherapy, a very high dose of medicines is given to the patients. Sometimes, patients need to be hospitalised because the drugs have to administered intravenously. In addition, patients suffer from severe side-effects, such as high fever and hair loss. The patients then require require monitoring of blood count and other biochemical parameters every 7-15 days. Metronomic chemotherapy, however, requires minimal monitoring, sometime once in three months. This is because of its excellent toxicity profile."
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