ArticleEuropean journal of clinical pharmacology2014
Off-label use of anticancer drugs in eastern Switzerland: a population-based prospective cohort study.
Article in European journal of clinical pharmacology, 2014. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 15 papers.
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Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 27 citations in OpenAlex.
- Off-label drug use in oncology practice: a nationwide cross-sectional survey among Turkish medical oncologists.BMC cancer · 2026Article
- Off-label use of immune checkpoint inhibitors for the treatment of solid tumors: analysis of a nationwide patient sample.Journal of cancer research and clinical oncology · 2023Article
- Characteristics and survival of patients with cancer with intended off-label use-a cohort study.BMJ open · 2022Article
- Switzerland's Narcotics Regulation Jungle: Off-Label Use, Counterfoil Prescriptions, and Opioid Agonist Therapy in the French-Speaking Cantons.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Article
- Association of Supporting Trial Evidence and Reimbursement for Off-Label Use of Cancer Drugs.JAMA network open · 2021Article
- Off-Label Use of Antineoplastic Drugs to Treat Malignancies: Evidence From China Based on a Nationwide Medical Insurance Data Analysis.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2021Article
- Factors Associated With Off-Label Oncology Prescriptions: The Role of Cost and Financing in a Universal Healthcare System.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2021Article
- Article
- The Off-Label Use of Antineoplastics in Oncology Is Limited But Has Notable Scientific Support in a University Hospital Setting.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2019Article
- Overuse in cancer care: do European studies provide information useful to support policies?Health research policy and systems · 2018Review
- Thalidomide and lenalidomide for recurrent ovarian cancer: A systematic review of the literature.Oncology letters · 2017Article
- Equal access to innovative therapies and precision cancer care.Nature reviews. Clinical oncology · 2016Review
- Safety, Effectiveness, and Costs of Bevacizumab-Based Therapy in Southern Spain: A Real World Experience.Medicine · 2016Observational
- Off-label use of targeted therapies in oncology.World journal of clinical oncology · 2016Review
- Outcomes of off-label drug uses in hospitals: a multicentric prospective study.European journal of clinical pharmacology · 2014Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
8 authors at 4 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
purposePrevalence data on the off-label use (OLU) of anticancer drugs are limited despite OLU being controversial for medical, pharmaco-economic, and ethical reasons. We therefore quantified and characterized the OLU of anticancer drugs and compared OLU based on the national drug label with international treatment recommendations.
methodsWe prospectively collected data on patients receiving systemic anticancer therapy between October and December 2012 at hospitals affiliated with the Eastern Switzerland Oncology Network. Individual data on patient characteristics, tumor disease, and systemic treatment were collected, and each individual treatment was compared with the national drug label and international treatment guidelines.
resultsA total of 985 consecutive patients receiving 1,737 anticancer drug treatments were included in the study. Overall, 32.4 % of all patients received at least one off-label drug, corresponding to 27.2 % of all anticancer drugs administered. Major reasons for OLU were the lack of approval for the specific disease entity (15.7 %) and modified application of the anticancer drug (10 %). OLU that was unsupported by the current European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) treatment recommendations was rare (6.6 %) but higher for bevacizumab (29.6 %) due to its use in treating advanced ovarian cancer beyond the second-line setting and advanced breast cancer beyond the first-line setting and for lenalidomide (22.6 %) due to its use in treating Non-Hodgkin lymphoma.
conclusionsBased on data collected on our patient cohort, OLU of anticancer drugs in a European clinical setting applies to one-third of all cancer patients. ESMO-unsupported use of chemotherapies or molecularly-targeted drugs is rare, opposing concerns that the off-label use of newer anticancer drugs is a substantial clinical problem.
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