# Stable disease

Source: https://onco.cc/terms/stable-disease/  
OnCo record `stable-disease` (Term). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

The tumours have neither shrunk enough to count as a response nor grown enough to count as progression. For a slow cancer or a well-tolerated drug, months of stability can be a real benefit.

## Summary

Under RECIST, stable disease is anything between a 30% decrease and a 20% increase in the sum of target-lesion diameters, with no new lesions. It is ambiguous on its own, because an indolent tumour may be stable without any treatment, so trials report the disease control rate (responses plus stable disease) with caution and prefer to measure how long disease stays controlled. Drugs that mainly stabilise rather than shrink, such as anti-angiogenics and some hormonal agents, are judged on progression-free and overall survival rather than response.

## Fields

- Kind: Term
- Last checked: 2026-09-09
- Also known as: disease stabilisation; disease stabilization; stabilised; stabilized; disease control; disease control rate; clinical benefit rate; DCR; CBR

## Sources

- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Response_evaluation_criteria_in_solid_tumors
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Response_evaluation_criteria_in_solid_tumors

## Connected records

- terms: [Complete response](https://onco.cc/terms/complete-response/), [Partial response](https://onco.cc/terms/partial-response/), [Progression](https://onco.cc/terms/progression/), [Progression-free survival (PFS)](https://onco.cc/terms/pfs/), [RECIST](https://onco.cc/terms/recist/)

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JSON: https://onco.cc/api/v1/entities/stable-disease.json