OnCo
termsTerm

Duration of response

aka DoR, durable response, durable responses, durability, long-lasting responses, median duration of response

How long a tumour stays shrunk once it has responded to a drug. A response that lasts two years is worth far more than one that lasts two months, so this is reported alongside response rate.

Measured from the first documented response to progression or death, and usually reported as a median plus the proportion of responders still responding at 6, 12 or 24 months. Immunotherapy's signature is not a high response rate but a long duration of response, with responses lasting years in a subset; conversely, many chemotherapy responses are brisk but short. Regulators weigh response rate and durability together when granting accelerated approval on single-arm data, and the durable-response tail is what turns survival curves into a plateau.

Category
Clinic basics

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