Personalized Medicine

San Francisco, CA—The combination of the PD-1 inhibitor durvalumab ­(Imfinzi) and the investigational CTLA-4 inhibitor tremelimumab plus best supportive care improved overall survival (OS) by more than 2 months versus best supportive care alone in a phase 2 clinical trial of patients with refractory colorectal cancer (CRC), reported Eric Xueyu Chen, MD, PhD, Staff Oncologist, Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, Toronto, Canada, at the 2019 Gastrointestinal Cancers Symposium.

On May 3, 2019, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved ado-trastuzumab emtansine (Kadcyla; Genentech) for the adjuvant treatment of patients with HER2-positive early breast cancer who have residual invasive disease after neoadjuvant taxane and trastuzumab-based treatment. Patients should be selected for treatment with this agent based on an FDA-approved companion diagnostic test (Ventana Medical System’s PATHWAY anti-HER-2/neu [4B5] Rabbit Monoclonal Primary Antibody assay or INFORM HER2 Dual ISH DNA Probe Cocktail assay).

San Francisco, CA—Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy is associated with unique adverse events that require vigilant monitoring, aggressive care, and specialized management. Marco L. Davila, MD, PhD, Medical Oncologist, Blood and Marrow Transplant and Cellular Immunotherapy Program, Moffitt Cancer Center, Tampa, FL, provided an overview of this topic at the 2019 ASCO-SITC Clinical Immuno-Oncology Symposium.

San Francisco, CA—Promising markers of response to immune checkpoint inhibition include tumor mutation burden (TMB) and genomic markers that reflect a disruption of the tumor immunity cycle, said Natalie Vokes, MD, MPhil, Medical Oncology Fellow, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, at the 2019 ASCO-SITC Clinical Immuno-Oncology Symposium.

San Francisco, CA—Moving PD-1 or PD-L1 inhibitors to an early line of therapy, immediately after chemoradiation, has improved survival for patients with unresectable, stage III non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

San Francisco, CA—Tumor expression of PD-L1 has consistently predicted ­response and survival outcomes in non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), whereas the role of PD-L1 in immune cells is unclear, said Edward B. Garon, MD, Director, Thoracic Oncology Program, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles, at the 2019 ASCO-SITC Clinical Immuno-Oncology Symposium.

San Francisco, CA—Many patients with leukemia or lymphoma who receive treatment with anti-CD19 chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy achieve minimum residual disease (MRD) negativity, and many are in complete remission well beyond 12 months.

For the second time this month, the FDA has given an approval to Genentech’s PD-L1 inhibitor, Tecentriq.

A dizzying array of new chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapies targeting the B-cell maturation antigen (BCMA) designed specifically for the treatment of multiple myeloma was presented at the 2018 American Society of Hematology (ASH) annual meeting. BCMA-targeted CAR T-cell therapies are designed to improve T-cell persistence, depth of response, and tolerability. Response rates reported at ASH 2018 range from 70% to 100%, depending on the patient population and the use of previous regimens.

San Diego, CA—Although chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy has achieved remarkable long-lasting remissions in B-cell malignancies, in approximately 60% of the cases, the initial response wanes over time because of “immune exhaustion.”