The relevance of stable disease (SD) as a surrogate end-point in advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients treated with erlotinib (E) as the second/third line.

7577 Background: SD has often been viewed as a result with an uncertain clinical value.With the advent of E in advanced NSCLC, increasing numbers of patients (pts) achieve SD as a best response. A common observation in clinical practice is that a high proportion of patients receiving E have durable SD.The aim of this analysis was to compare the progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) in pts with advanced NSCLC who achieved confirmed SD or complete/partial response (CR+PR) after second/third line treatment with E. Methods: Data from 684 Italian pts from the TRUST trial (Tiseo M et al. Lung Cancer 2008) were analyzed. E was administered orally at 150 mg per day and was continued until disease progression, development of unacceptable toxicity or patient’s refusal. We define confirmed SD (cSD) if the patients’ PFS was ≥5 months (response to E was evaluated per protocol every two months) and reconfirmed SD (rSD) if the patients’ PFS was ≥8 months. Results: Pts’ characteristics included the fo...