Efficacy of injectable maropitant (Cerenia[trade mark sign]) in a randomized clinical trial for prevention and treatment of cisplatin-induced emesis in dogs presented as veterinary patients

Chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting (CINV) is a common side-effect of cisplatin therapy. Maropitant (Cerenia[trade mark sign]), a novel neurokinin-1 receptor antagonist, was evaluated for prevention and treatment of cisplatin-induced emesis in tumour-bearing dogs. Dogs (n= 122) were randomly allocated to three treatment groups: T01, placebo before and after cisplatin; T02, placebo before and maropitant after cisplatin; or T03, maropitant before and placebo after cisplatin. Maropitant treatment (T02) following a cisplatin-induced-emetic event resulted in significantly fewer subsequent emetic events (P= 0.0005) than in placebo-treated dogs (T01). In placebo-treated (T01) dogs, 56.4% were withdrawn from the study because of treatment failure compared with 5.3% in group T02. When maropitant was administered prior to cisplatin treatment (T03) in a prevention regime, 94.9% did not vomit compared with only 4.9% of placebo-treated dogs, and significantly fewer emetic events (P < 0.0001) were observed in those dogs that did vomit. In summary, maropitant was safe and highly effective in reducing or completely preventing cisplatin-induced emesis.