Real-world effectiveness of novel hormonal agents and docetaxel in patients with prostate cancer: A head-to-head comparison

Next-generation hormonal-targeted therapies for advanced prostate cancer are widely used. We aimed to evaluate the effectiveness and health resource utilization (HRU) of novel hormonal agents (NHAs) compared to chemotherapy in a real-world context. After propensity score matching, survival analysis revealed no significant difference in overall survival between the individuals treated with NHAs and those treated with docetaxel (hazard ratio [HR]: 1.00, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 0.89-1.11) in the cohort of 1,056 patients. Similar results were observed for prostate-specific antigen (PSA) progression-free survival (HR: 1.02, 95% CI: 0.91-1.14) and PSA response rate (72% [95% CI: 68-76%] for NHAs vs. 76% [95% CI: 72-80%] for docetaxel, <i>p</i> > 0.05). Additionally, patients treated with NHAs had a significantly lower annual HRU during follow up. These findings indicate comparable effectiveness between NHAs and chemotherapy, with a more favorable HRU profile for NHA-treated patients, suggesting potential cost-effectiveness of NHAs.