Survival outcomes of east Asian patients with advanced non‐small cell lung cancer treated with first‐line EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitors: A network meta‐analysis of real‐world evidence

Abstract Background The comparative efficacies of different generation tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) in epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)‐mutated advanced non‐small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) remain largely unknown. Moreover, whether one EGFR‐TKI confers superior survival remains unclear, especially in East Asians. We conducted a network meta‐analysis (NMA) comparing the survival outcomes of East Asian patients with advanced NSCLC treated with first‐line EGFR‐TKIs. Methods The NMA included observational real‐world evidence studies on adult patients with EGFR‐mutated advanced NSCLC who received first (gefitinib and erlotinib), second (afatinib), or third (osimertinib) generation EGFR‐TKIs as frontline therapy. Studies were identified through an online bibliographic search of Medline articles in the PubMed, SCOPUS, Web of Science, and Cochrane Library databases. Results For overall survival (OS), afatinib had significantly better hazard ratios (HRs) than osimertinib (HR: 0.46, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.23–0.91), gefitinib (HR: 0.56, 95% CI: 0.43–0.72), and erlotinib (HR: 0.71, 95% CI: 0.54–0.92). For progression‐free survival (PFS), afatinib had significantly better HRs than gefitinib (HR: 0.45, 95% CI: 0.36–0.56) and erlotinib (HR: 0.63, 95% CI: 0.49–0.81). Moreover, afatinib was most likely to achieve the longest OS (81.3%), followed by erlotinib (13%), osimertinib, and gefitinib. Furthermore, afatinib was most likely to achieve the longest PFS (48.3%), followed by osimertinib (34.9%) and erlotinib. Conclusions This real‐world evidence shows that afatinib confers better survival than other first‐line EGFR‐TKIs in East Asian patients with advanced NSCLC