90 year old ASPS patient

[D.ap]

Durable clinical activity of single-agent bevacizumab in a nonagenarian patient with metastatic alveolar soft part sarcoma.


http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/22 ... 04/related

[Olga]

It is an interesting report. We had one ASPS patient taking bevacizumab (Avastin) with the good response but it was short lived with the resistance developed and rapid regrowth followed - probably the VEGF is different (elevated) in the young and still growing people versus someone that old. I remember there were combination trials with avastin but I do not know if anything interesting was found.

[Bonni Hess]

This is an interesting and encouraging article regarding the possible effectiveness of Avastin (Bevacizumab) for ASPS, especially since all of the ASPS patients who I am personally aware of who were treated with Avastin unfortunately did not have a very successful or sustained response to the drug. Of course, each patient is different and may respond differently to the same drug, and there may be exceptions to the unsuccessful or successful responses of patients, which is apparently the situation in this case. It should be noted that this report was published in 2012, and the patient only had a partial response of her lung mets, so it would be very important to try to determine what her current status is and if she continued to have a sustained response of stable disease with tumor shrinkage/disappearance before making an Avastin treatment decision based on this single anecdotal seemingly successful Avastin response by one elderly ASPS patient. Certainly more research and documented data of Avastin treatment success and results for ASPS patients would be warranted and needed prior to beginning Avastin treatment.
With special caring thoughts and continued Hope,
Bonni