Progression-free survival: helpful biomarker or clinically meaningless end point?

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

Who cites it

12 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.

1. Correlations of survival with progression-free survival, response rate, and disease control rate in advanced biliary tract cancer: a meta-analysis of randomised trials of first-line chemotherapy.British journal of cancer · 2016
   Pooled it
2. Overall response rate, progression-free survival, and overall survival with targeted and standard therapies in advanced non-small-cell lung cancer: US Food and Drug Administration trial-level and patient-level analyses.Journal of clinical oncology : official journal of the American Society of Clinical Oncology · 2015
   Pooled it
3. Advances in Molecular Imaging for Neuroendocrine Neoplasms.Cancers · 2025
   Review
4. Tumor-size responses to first-line is a predictor of overall survival in metastatic colorectal cancer.European radiology · 2019
   Article
5. Optimizing sequential treatment with anti-EGFR and VEGF mAb in metastatic colorectal cancer: current results and controversies.Cancer management and research · 2019
   Review
6. Progression-free survival as a surrogate endpoint for overall survival in modern ovarian cancer trials: a meta-analysis.Therapeutic advances in medical oncology · 2018
   Article
7. Association Between Tumor Progression Endpoints and Overall Survival in Patients with Advanced Neuroendocrine Tumors.The oncologist · 2017
   Article
8. First-Line Treatment of Metastatic Colorectal Cancer: Interpreting FIRE-3, PEAK, and CALGB/SWOG 80405.Current treatment options in oncology · 2015
   Review
9. Joint prognostic effect of obesity and chronic systemic inflammation in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer.Cancer · 2015
   Article
10. Have we given up on a cure for ovarian cancer?Current oncology (Toronto, Ont.) · 2015
    Article
11. Should FOLFOXIRI plus bevacizumab Be the standard first-line therapy in metastatic colorectal cancer?The oncologist · 2015
    Article
12. Postmarket safety of drugs approved by Health Canada on the basis of clinical and surrogate outcomes: a cohort study.CMAJ open
    Article

Corrections and comments

• Comment on
  Resampling the N9741 trial to compare tumor dynamic versus conventional end points in randomized phase II trials.2015
• Comment on
  Individual patient data analysis of progression-free survival versus overall survival as a first-line end point for metastatic colorectal cancer in modern randomized trials: findings from the analysis and research in cancers of the digestive system database.2015

Authors and funding

2 authors.

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

Abstract

PubMed holds no abstract for this paper.

Indexed as