Individual patient based meta-analysis of lentinan for unresectable/recurrent gastric cancer.

BACKGROUND: In the present study, the effect of immunochemotherapy with lentinan compared with that of chemotherapy alone was evaluated in patients with advanced gastric cancer through individual patient data (IPD) meta-analysis. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Based on a computerized and manual search, all eligible centrally randomized controlled trials (RCT) which compared chemotherapy regimens with or without lentinan administration for advanced gastric cancer patients were included. RESULTS: In total, 650 IPD from 5 trials were available. Lentinan significantly prolonged the overall survival (stratified log-rank p=0.011). The overall hazard ratio (HR) was 0.80 (95% confidence interval=0.68-0.95) and there was no heterogeneity between trials. Additionally, lentinan was possibly more effective in patients with lymph-node metastasis than in non-node metastasis patients (P for interaction=0.077). CONCLUSION: The addition of lentinan to standard chemotherapy offers a significant advantage over chemotherapy alone in terms of survival for patients with advanced gastric cancer.