Dysgeusia in patients with advanced urothelial carcinoma receiving enfortumab vedotin, platinum-based chemotherapy, or immune check point inhibitors: time-course assessment using chemotherapy-induced taste alteration scale

Abstract

A time-course questionnaire survey using the chemotherapy-induced taste alteration scale (CiTAS) was conducted in patients with advanced urothelial carcinoma (UC) treated with systemic chemotherapy and/or immunotherapy. A total of 37 patients receiving systemic therapy with enfortumab vedotin (EV), platinum-based chemotherapy and immune checkpoint inhibitors were included in this study. No significant changes were observed in any of the CiTAS subscales during platinum-based chemotherapy and immune checkpoint inhibitor treatment, while EV therapy induced significant dysgeusia. Among 10 patients treated with EV, dysgeusia was associated with a substantial negative effect on the health-related quality-of-life domains, particularly global health status/QOL (mean ± standard deviation: 52 ± 19 in dysgeusia group vs 89 ± 13 in non-dysgeusia group) and mental component summary (47 ± 5.1 vs 53 ± 2.0). The fatigue symptom score was higher in the dysgeusia group at the post-third cycle of EV (47 ± 16 vs 15 ± 17). Severe dysgeusia can be induced by EV therapy, which is usually not observed in other systemic therapies for advanced UC.

Keywords:

• Chemotherapy
• dysgeusia
• enfortumab vedotin
• patient reported outcome measures
• urothelial carcinoma

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to their patients and the staff of our institution for his assistance and support for this study.

Ethics approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. All patients signed informed consent before treatment onset and the study was approved by the Ethics Committee of the Nara Medical University (protocol ID: NMU-1719).

Authors’ contributions

Study conceptualization and design: Makito Miyake. Formal analysis and investigation: Nobutaka Nishimura, Yuki Oda, and Tatsuki Miyamoto. Funding acquisition: Makito Miyake. Material preparation and data collection: Mitsuru Tomizawa, Takuto Shimizu, Shunta Hori, Yosuke Morizawa, Daisuke Gotoh, Yasushi Nakai, Kazumasa Torimoto, and Tomomi Fujii. Writing – original draft: Makito Miyake. Writing – review & editing: Nobumichi Tanaka, Kiyohide Fujimoto. All authors contributed substantially and helped revise previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Disclosure statement

In accordance with Taylor & Francis policy and my ethical obligation as a researcher, I am reporting that M. Miyake and K. Fujimoto received as honoraria, consulting fees and lecture fees from Merck Biopharma Co., Ltd., MSD K.K., Ono pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. and Astellas Pharma Inc, that may be affected by the research reported in the enclosed paper. I have disclosed those interests fully to Taylor & Francis, and I have in place an approved plan for managing any potential conflicts arising from those company. Other authors disclose no potential conflicts of interest.

Data availability statement

The data used to support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon request.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by JSPS KAKENHI grant numbers [23K08720] (Makito Miyake).