Sutent and Radiation as Treatment for Limited Extent Metastatic Cancer
Status:
Completed
Trial end date:
2014-07-01
Target enrollment:
Participant gender:
Summary
Cancer is the second leading cause of death in the United States, with approximately 90% of
deaths resulting from patients with metastatic spread. Save for notable exceptions such as
testicular cancer, chemotherapy alone cannot cure patients with metastases. Some patients
with limited metastatic deposits (most commonly colon cancer spread to the liver) can be
cured with surgery followed by chemotherapy. Therefore, some patients with metastases should
be considered for aggressive local therapy (surgery and/or radiation).
Even though chemotherapy has improved significantly, patients treated with conventional
chemotherapy and/or biologically targeted therapy are not cured of their disease. For the
most common types of cancer, chemotherapy alone can shrink or stabilize tumors for an average
of 6 months before the tumors regrow. Both chemotherapy and biologically targeted therapy
have major limitations preventing cure of these patients.
Radiation therapy is an effective modality of treating cancer. Until recently, radiation for
metastases was used only to relieve symptoms resulting from local tumor growth. Technological
advances, including stereotactic radiotherapy, allow for radiation to be more precisely
delivered to the tumor while sparing nearby normal organs. Stereotactic radiotherapy can
completely eradicate local tumors with minimal side effects. Stereotactic radiotherapy has
never been combined with drug therapy. Sutent is a new F.D.A. approved cancer therapy that
targets tumor blood vessels. It is effective against two types of cancer that rarely respond
to chemotherapy (GI stromal tumors and kidney cancer). We propose combining biologically
targeted drug therapy with physically targeted stereotactic radiotherapy. Our goal is to
determine if this is a safe regimen and the best method of combining these treatments.
Ultimately, our goal is to cure some patients with previously incurable metastatic cancer
with this combination.