OBJECTIVES: Continuous intensified androgen deprivation therapy (iADT) is the standard-of-care for metastatic prostate cancer, yet its side-effects greatly impact patients’ health-related quality of life (HRQoL). While intermittent iADT may improve patients’ HRQoL, the potential risk for loss in overall survival should be considered. This research is supportive to the non-inferiority DE-ESCALATE trial (EORTC 2238) and aims to assess patients’ preferences and trade-offs regarding the benefits and risks associated with continuous versus intermittent iADT.

METHODS: A literature study with a systematic search was performed in PubMed and Embase using the following key concepts and its synonyms: “Unmet Medical Needs”, “Patient Preferences”, “HRQoL”, “Overall Survival” and “Metastatic Prostate Cancer”. For the title/abstract and full-text screening, 10% of the articles were screened by two independent researchers. Subsequently, qualitative semi-structured interviews will be conducted with metastatic hormone-sensitive prostate cancer (mHSPC) patients (n=30) across Europe to explore disease or treatment attributes they find most important and how they assess the benefits and risks associated with continuous or intermittent iADT.

RESULTS: The literature search retrieved 5788 articles. After de-duplication (n=1741), 4047 articles were screened for title/abstract. An accordance rate of 93% was achieved during the 10% double-blind title/abstract screening. The results from the literature study will be used to inform the subsequent qualitative interviews with mHSPC patients. The full results of the literature review and the interviews will be presented.

CONCLUSIONS: The results from the qualitative interviews will provide insights into patients’ assessment and trade-offs of HRQoL benefits and overall survival risks associated with continuous versus intermittent iADT. These findings will be used in a subsequent quantitative patient preference study (discrete choice experiment) to (i) support the interpretation of the DE-ESCALATE trial by identifying acceptable risk-benefit trade-offs and to (ii) verify the use of appropriate patient-reported outcome measures to assess the impact of continuous versus intermittent iADT on patients’ HRQoL.