Platinum Agent-Induced Hypersensitivity Reactions: Data Mining of the Public Version of the FDA Adverse Event Reporting System, AERS

OBJECTIVE Adverse event reports (AERs) submitted to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) were reviewed to confirm the platinum agent-associated mild, severe, and lethal hypersensitivity reactions. METHODS Authorized pharmacovigilance tools were used for quantitative signal detection, including the proportional reporting ratio, the reporting odds ratio, the information component given by a Bayesian confidence propagation neural network, and the empirical Bayes geometric mean. Excess2, given by the multi-item gamma Poisson Shrinker algorithm, was used to evaluate the effects of dexamethasone and diphenhydramine on oxaliplatin-induced hypersensitivity reactions. RESULTS Based on 1,644,220 AERs from 2004 to 2009, carboplatin and oxaliplatin proved to cause mild, severe, and lethal hypersensitivity reactions, whereas cisplatin did not. Dexamethasone affected oxaliplatin-induced mild hypersensitivity reactions, but had lesser effects on severe and lethal reactions. The effects of diphenhydramine were not confirmed. CONCLUSION The FDA's adverse event reporting system, AERS, with optimized data mining tools is useful to authorize potential associations between platinum agents and hypersensitivity reactions.