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Maintenance treatment in advanced HER2-negative gastric cancer

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Abstract

Survival for patients with advanced gastric cancer (GC) remains poor. Systemic chemotherapy which has reached a plateau stays the standard first-line (1L) treatment for advanced human epidermal growth-factor receptor 2 (HER2)-negative GC. To maximize the benefit of 1L treatment, the concept of maintenance treatment is constantly being explored. In advanced HER2-negative GC, current clinical guidelines do not recommend a standard maintenance therapy strategy. In addition to the monotherapy maintenance with fluorouracil after 4–6 cycles of 1L chemotherapy, some agents that are active against novel targets have been evaluated in clinical trials for maintenance treatment. Whereas most of these trials do not reach their primary endpoints, they open new horizons for the 1L treatment of advanced HER2-negative GC. Therefore, we reviewed the clinical trials in the field of maintenance treatment in advanced HER2-negative GC and discussed some of the problems in clinical trials.

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Acknowledgements

This work is supported by the by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 81403220), Tianjin Health and family planning-high level talent selection and training project, Tianjin Science and Technology Plan Projects (No. 17ZXMFSY00190) and Tianjin Traditional Chinese Medicine Research Project, Tianjin health and family planning commission (No. 2017003).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Oncology, First Teaching Hospital of Tianjin University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Anshanxi Road, Nankai District, Tianjin, 300193, China

    Y. Yao, R. Deng, D. Liao, H. Xie, J. Zuo, Y. Jia & F. Kong

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  1. Y. Yao
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  2. R. Deng
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  3. D. Liao
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Correspondence to F. Kong.

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Yao, Y., Deng, R., Liao, D. et al. Maintenance treatment in advanced HER2-negative gastric cancer. Clin Transl Oncol 22, 2206–2212 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12094-020-02379-7

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