Etoposide, vincristine, doxorubicin and dexamethasone (EVAD) combination chemotherapy as second-line treatment for advanced AIDS-related Kaposi's sarcoma.

Objective: To evaluate through retrospective analysis the efficacy and toxicity of combination chemotherapy with etoposide, vincristine, doxorubin and dexamethasone (EVAD) as second-line therapy in patients with advanced AIDS-related Kaposi's sarcoma (AIDS-KS) after failure of first-line chemotherapy.

Methods: Eighty-eight patients with poor-risk AIDS-KS were treated intravenously with combination chemotherapy with EVAD; etoposide at a dose of 100 mg/m(2) on three consecutive days, vincristine 1.4 mg/m(2) with a maximum single dosage of 2.0 mg on day one, doxorubicin 30 mg/m(2) on day one and dexamethasone 40 mg on three consecutive days, with a three week cycle. All eligible patients had relapsed or progressed after prior two to six cycles of combination chemotherapy with doxorubicin, bleomycin and vincristine (ABV) or bleomycin and vincristine (BV).

Results: Assessment of the response of all the patients was made. The overall objective response rate was 59.1% (95% CI 48.83-69.37%), with five complete responses and 47 partial responses. Twenty-six cases of stable disease and 10 of progressive disease were observed in the remaining patients. The median follow-up period was 27 months (range 8-52 months). The median time to progression was 6.80 months (95% CI 2.04-11.56 months), and the median overall survival was 14.24 months (95% CI 10.26-18.22 months). Leucopenia was seen in 92.0% of patients, of which 20 patients had grade 3 and 12 had grade 4. Conclusions Combination chemotherapy with EVAD offers a new, active and safe therapeutic approach for the treatment of advanced AIDS-related KS.