Two-Drug Combination Chemotherapy Compared With Four-Drug Combination Chemotherapy in Treating Patients With Advanced Cancer of the Urothelium

Overview

RATIONALE: Drugs used in chemotherapy use different ways to stop tumor cells from dividing so they stop growing or die. Combining more than one drug may kill more tumor cells. It is not yet known if four-drug combination chemotherapy is more effective than two-drug combination chemotherapy in treating advanced cancer of the urothelium. PURPOSE: Randomized phase III trial to compare the effectiveness of four-drug combination chemotherapy with that of two-drug combination chemotherapy in treating patients who have advanced cancer of the urothelium.

OBJECTIVES: I. Compare the objective response rate, duration of remission, overall survival, and quality of life of patients with progressing regional or metastatic transitional cell carcinoma (or mixed histologies with a component of transitional cell carcinoma) of the urothelium treated with methotrexate, vinblastine, doxorubicin, and cisplatin vs carboplatin and paclitaxel. II. Compare the relative toxic effects of these treatment regimens in this patient population. OUTLINE: This is a randomized, multicenter study. Patients are randomized to 1 of 2 treatment arms. Arm I: Patients receive methotrexate IV on days 1, 15, and 22; vinblastine IV on days 2, 15, and 22; and cisplatin IV over 2 hours and doxorubicin IV on day 2. Treatment repeats every 28 days for a total of 6 courses in the absence of unacceptable toxicity or disease progression. Arm II: Patients receive paclitaxel IV over 3 hours immediately followed by carboplatin IV over 30 minutes. Treatment repeats every 21 days for a total of 6 courses in the absence of unacceptable toxicity or disease progression. Quality of life is assessed before treatment, before courses 2 and 4, at 4 weeks after last course, and at 10 months. Patients are followed every 3 months for 1 year and then every 6 months until disease progression. PROJECTED ACCRUAL: A total of 330 patients will be accrued for this study within 3.3 years.