BACKGROUND: Regimens that combine irinotecan or etoposide with cisplatin or carboplatin have been recommended as first-line regimen for extensive-disease small cell lung cancer (ED-SCLC). In our network meta-analysis, we synthesized the direct and indirect lines of evidence to rank the short-term efficacies of these recommended chemotherapy regimens. METHODS: We searched databases, including EMBASE, PubMed, CENTRAL and clinicaltrial.gov, for relevant randomized controlled trials (RCTs) that compared the efficacies of these treatments. A risk of bias tool was used to evaluate the quality of the included studies, whereas Stata 13.1 was used for statistical synthesis. RESULTS: Our study included 10 RCTs that involved 2,378 patients. Compared with that of the regimen that combined etoposide and carboplatin, the complete remission rate was significantly higher in the group treated with irinotecan combined with carboplatin. The efficacy of the regimen that combined irinotecan with carboplatin was significantly superior over that of the combination of etoposide and cisplatin. CONCLUSIONS: Our data presented here suggest that the effect of Irinotecan combination with Carboplatin is remarkably superior.
