A trial comparing temozolomide with dacarbazine for advanced melanoma skin cancer (EORTC 18032)

Cancer type:

Melanoma

Skin cancer

Status:

Results

Phase:

Phase 3

This trial compared temozolomide with dacarbazine for people with advanced melanoma that could not be removed with an operation.

Doctors usually treat advanced melanoma with chemotherapy. The most commonly used drug is dacarbazine (DTIC). Another chemotherapy drug called temozolomide can also be helpful for this group of patients.

In this trial doctors compared dacarbazine with a higher dose of temozolomide, given more often than the standard dose.

The aims of this trial were to

See if temozolomide at a higher, more frequent dose worked better than dacarbazine for advanced melanoma
Find out more about the side effects

Summary of results

The trial team found that having higher dose temozolomide more frequently than the standard dose was no better than dacarbazine for people with advanced melanoma.

The trial recruited 859 people

Half had temozolomide
Half had dacarbazine

About 18 months after treatment had finished, the researchers looked at how long people lived for. They found there was no difference between the 2 treatment groups.

The main side effect for people in both groups was a drop in blood counts. This was slightly worse for the people who had temozolomide.

We have based this summary on information from the team who ran the trial. The information they sent us has been reviewed by independent specialists (peer reviewed Open a glossary item ) but may not have been published in a medical journal. The figures we quote above were provided by the trial team. We have not analysed the data ourselves.