Varian, a Siemens Healthineers company, has been recognized as the Society of Interventional Oncology’s Exclusive Pioneer Trial Partner for a ground-breaking trial designed to evaluate whether combining palliative radiation therapy and percutaneous ablation is an effective treatment option for pain relief and tumor management in metastatic bone disease.
Approximately 400,000 new cases of malignant bone metastasis are diagnosed in the United States each year, often causing limb dysfunction, pathological fractures, spinal cord compression, and severe pain, seriously affecting the quality of life of patients with advanced cancer and poor prognoses.
Opioid therapy is a mainstay of treatment for painful bone metastases, but nearly one-third of patients complain of non-responsive or refractory pain. A combination of palliative RT and percutaneous ablation may provide a valuable alternative.
Treatment of metastatic bone disease is costly, accounting for nearly one-fifth of the total cost of oncologic treatment, or about $40 billion a year in the United States. Multiple studies have found that advanced metastatic bone disease results in overall poor outcomes with regards to the socioeconomic and psychosocial effects on not only patients and their families, but also society at large.
The multi-million-dollar TRIBUTE: A Multi-Center Observational Trial of Symptomatic, High-Risk Bone Metastases Treated with Percutaneous Ablation and Palliative Radiation Therapy study, was announced Jan. 31 at SIO’s 2025 Annual Scientific Meeting, and is the first prospective, multi-center study to evaluate real-world outcomes in adult patients with bone metastases treated with both percutaneous ablation and palliative radiation therapy. The TRIBUTE study is set to launch this year with the enrollment of 120 subjects across sites in the United States and is expected to last about 2 ½ years.
“Collaboration between medical disciplines is essential to moving cancer healthcare forward and Varian is committed to investing in high-quality, multi-disciplinary research, such as the TRIBUTE trial, to impact patient lives.”
- Deepak “Dee” Khuntia, MD,
Senior Vice President, Medical Affairs & Chief Medical Officer for Varian.
Varian is committed to pioneering advances in radiotherapy and to supporting multi-disciplinary research that improves patient care, said Deepak “Dee” Khuntia, MD, Senior Vice President, Medical Affairs & Chief Medical Officer for Varian, adding the TRIBUTE trial represents a valuable opportunity to bring the fields of interventional radiology and radiation oncology together to help improve quality of life in patients with painful bone metastases.
“Collaboration between medical disciplines is essential to moving cancer healthcare forward and Varian is committed to investing in high-quality, multi-disciplinary research, such as the TRIBUTE trial, to impact patient lives,” Khuntia said.
David Hahn, MD, Vice President of Medical Affairs for Interventional Solutions for Varian, noted that patients with cancer that spreads to the bone often experience significant pain that seriously impacts their quality of life.
“We look forward to TRIBUTE generating high quality data demonstrating the potential for these therapies to combine for optimal outcomes,” Hahn said.
Percutaneous ablation and radiation therapy have different mechanisms of alleviating pain and causing tumor death that may work synergistically. Radiation therapy is a widely accepted treatment for painful bone metastases and provides palliation of pain for patients. Percutaneous ablation is a minimally invasive therapy for painful metastatic bone disease and requires minimal recovery. Combining the two therapies is an approach already in use to treat patients with metastatic lung cancer.
The multidisciplinary TRIBUTE study was collaboratively designed and developed with radiation oncology and interventional oncology, which SIO sees as critical to the success of the study.
Varian’s support of TRIBUTE adds to its ongoing commitment to supporting the development of clinical research needed to advance the standard of care, with more than 300 research studies underway and more than 120 active clinical collaborations.
“We are in a unique position to drive connection, integration and collaboration across disciplines due to our high investment in clinical partnerships, a comprehensive portfolio and our global market reach,” Khuntia said.
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- Filippiadis DK, Yevich S, Deschamps F, Jennings JW, Tutton S, Kelekis A. The Role of Ablation in Cancer Pain Relief. Curr Oncol Rep. 2019;21(12):105. doi:10.1007/s11912-019-0844-9
- Filippiadis DK, Yevich S, Deschamps F, Jennings JW, Tutton S, Kelekis A. The Role of Ablation in Cancer Pain Relief. Curr Oncol Rep. 2019;21(12):105. doi:10.1007/s11912-019-0844-9
- DiCaprio MR, Murtaza H, Palmer B, Evangelist M. Narrative review of the epidemiology, economic burden, and societal impact of metastatic bone disease. Ann Joint 2022;7:28. PMID: 38529136
- National Comprehensive Cancer Network. Adult Cancer Pain (Version 1.2024). Accessed February 2, 2024