Objectives Despite paclitaxel has been used routinely in gynecological tumors, there are still few studies in literature that have investigated its efficacy and tolerability as salvage therapy. The aim of this study is to examine weekly paclitaxel’s efficacy and tolerability as salvage therapy in patients diagnosed with gynecological tumors.

Methods A retrospective study was conducted on 96 patients diagnosed in our ‘II Clinica Ginecologica’ of Policlinico di Bari, between October 1992 and July 2019. Inclusion criteria were: 1) diagnosis of ovarian, endometrial, or cervical tumor 2) patients who received treatment with weekly paclitaxel as salvage therapy To evaluate the efficacy, PFS and OS were elaborated with Kaplan Meier curves and compared with Log Rank test. Response to therapy was also considered (stable disease or partial response vs progression of disease). Tolerability was evaluated collecting data about adverse events from medical records.

Ovarian tumor 81/96 cases; OS median 13 months (7,6–18,4); PFS median 17 weeks (12,8–21,1); positive response 68,6% Endometrial tumor: 9/96 cases; OS median 9 months (0–17,9); PFS median 18 weeks (5,2–30,7); positive response 77,8% Cervical tumor: 6/96 cases; OS median 19 months (10,4–27,5); PFS median 23 weeks (0–50,9); positive response 66,7% Toxicity: 18,4% anemia; 12,6% leucopenia; 3,4% peripheral neuropathy; 2,3% myalgia/arthralgia; 1,1% cardiac toxicity; 1,1% ocular toxicity; 2,3% thrombocytopenia.

Conclusions With this study, the efficacy of weekly paclitaxel as salvage therapy can be confirmed. Moreover, this treatment is well tolerated by patients.