Severity of skin rash was associated with treatment outcome in terms of progression free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) in cancer patients treated with tyrosine kinase inhibitors.
Drug-metabolising activity assessed by the erlotinib/O-desmethyl-erlotinib metabolic ratio was observed to be correlated with the severity of skin rash in that way that high metabolic activity lowers the occurrence of skin rash.
The erlotinib/O-desmethyl-erlotinib metabolic ratio was also highly associated with PFS and OS in cancer patients.
The individual metabolic activity of erlotinib determined in serum may be helpful for therapeutic monitoring in erlotinib treatment and decisions on individual dosing to rash in rash-negative cancer patients.