The Impact of Smoking on Nivolumab Outcomes in Renal Cell Carcinoma: Real-World Data From the Turkish Oncology Group Kidney Cancer Consortium

Abstract

Background: The study aims to evaluate the effect of smoking status on treatment results in patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (RCC) treated with nivolumab in the second and following lines of therapy. Materials and Methods: The Turkish Oncology Group Kidney Cancer Consortium (TKCC) database was used to extract retrospective data from patients with metastatic RCC treated with nivolumab in the second line and beyond. Patients were evaluated according to their smoking status. Results: A total of 247 patients were evaluated. The majority of the current smokers were male (93.8%, P = .002). Nivolumab is mainly used in the second-line therapy (84.2%). Median time to treatment failure (TTF) and median overall survival were shorter in patients with currently smoking (10.81 vs. 4.11 months, P < .001 and 32.33 vs. 16.76 months, P < .049, respectively). Multivariate analysis showed that current smoking status was an independent adverse factor on median TTF (HR 2.06 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.20-3.54, P = .009) and median OS (, HR 2.06, 95% CI = 1.25-3.38, P = .004) in metastatic RCC patients treated with nivolumab in the second line and beyond. Conclusions: Current smoking status is an independent adverse prognostic factor for both TTF and OS in patients with metastatic RCC treated with nivolumab in the second line and beyond.