metopimazine easing in emesis
TRANSCRIPT
Reactions 1083 - 7 Jan 2006
Metopimazine easing in emesisMetopimazine is an effective alternative to
ondansetron in the prophylaxis of delayedchemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting, reportresearchers from France.
In their open-label study, 99 patients wererandomised into two groups: group 1 receivedsublingual metopimazine 15mg three times daily andoral methylprednisolone 48 mg/day for 5 days after thefirst chemotherapy session, then ondansetronlyophilisate 8mg twice daily and methylprednisolone for5 days the second chemotherapy session; group 2received the treatments in the reverse order.*
Treatment with metopimazine/methylprednisolonewas associated with significantly higher success ratesnausea and vomiting prophylaxis, compared withondansetron/methylprednisolone (73.6% vs 57.5%).Separate analysis of nausea and vomiting showed that,of 29 pairs discordant for nausea, 21 were successfullytreated with metopimazine; of 15 pairs discordant forvomiting, 13 responded to metopimazine.
There were no significant differences between the twogroups in overall quality of life. However, two individualcomponents of the Functional Living Index Emesisquestionnaire (‘Has vomiting prevented you fromcarrying out your normal leisure activities?’ and ‘Hasnausea prevented you from preparing meals or otherhousework?’) were scored significantly in favour ofmetopimazine (2.07 vs 2.79 and 0.94 vs 1.24).
Adverse events were mostly GI in nature and weresignificantly more common in patients receivingondansetron. Constipation was twice as frequent andmore severe during ondansetron treatment, comparedwith metopimazine.* This study was supported by a grant from Schwarz Pharma.
Bloch J, et al. Comparison of the efficacy and safety of combinations ofmetopimazine or ondansetron with methylprednisolone in the prevention ofdelayed emesis in patients receiving chemotherapy. Current Medical Research andOpinion 21: 1763-1771, No. 11, Nov 2005 801027091
1
Reactions 7 Jan 2006 No. 10830114-9954/10/1083-0001/$14.95 Adis © 2010 Springer International Publishing AG. All rights reserved