Immuno-Oncology

The addition of the PD-L1 inhibitor atezolizumab to the MEK inhibitor cobimetinib and the BRAF inhibitor vemurafenib induced a high response rate for patients with BRAF-mutant unresectable melanoma.

With immunotherapy agents showing significant promise in bladder cancer, the potential for these agents in the neoadjuvant setting is wide open.

Following a long drought in the development of bladder cancer treatments, the field is now poised to benefit from a series of rapid advances ushered in by highly effective immunotherapies.

A window of opportunity exists in which some patients with non–muscle-invasive bladder cancer could benefit from trying novel second-line therapies prior to surgery.

Looking ahead to 2020, most participants on an expert panel projected that immunotherapy will be critical to optimizing outcomes in the adjuvant setting for patients with renal cell carcinoma.

Elizabeth Plimack, MD, director of Genitourinary Clinical Research at Fox Chase Cancer Center, discusses updated findings from the CheckMate-025 trial, which compared the efficacy of nivolumab (Opdivo) with everolimus (Afinitor) in patients with renal cell carcinoma.

Nicholas G. Cost, MD, assistant professor, Surgery-Urology, Department of Pediatric Urology/ Urologic Oncology, University of Colorado Denver, discusses a clinical trial exploring pembrolizumab (Keytruda) plus axitinib (Inlyta) in patients with renal cell carcinoma (RCC).

Jason Luke, MD, an assistant professor of Medicine at the University of Chicago Medicine, discusses the role for immunotherapy and targeted agents in patients with BRAF-positive melanoma.

Enrolling clinical trials can be a long process, especially in rare diseases with limited patient populations. This is a particularly significant issue for patients with anaplastic thyroid cancer, an extremely rare and aggressive disease.

Gregory L. Beatty, MD, PhD, who focuses his research on understanding the role of innate immunity in gastrointestinal malignancies, discusses CD47 as an anticancer target.

Mohammed Haseebuddin, MD, a fellow in Urologic Oncology at Fox Chase Cancer Center, discuses why continued research into immunotherapy in clear cell renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is important, particularly in the adjuvant and neoadjuvant settings.

David L. Rimm, MD, PhD, professor of pathology and of medicine, director of pathology tissue services, director of translational pathology, Yale Cancer Center, discusses the continued role for PD-L1 testing to predict response with checkpoint inhibitors in non­–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

Jena D. French, PhD, instructor of medicine, division of endocrinology, metabolism and diabetes, Anschutz Medical Campus, University of Colorado, discusses the potential for immunotherapy combinations with lenvatinib in differentiated thyroid cancer.

Sumanta Kumar Pal, MD, medical oncologist, assistant clinical professor, Department of Medical Oncology and Therapeutics Research, City of Hope, discusses the challenges with sequencing the therapies available for patients with renal cell carcinoma (RCC). Pal shared this insight in an interview during the 2016 OncLive State of the Science Summit on GU Cancer.

Jonathan D. Schoenfeld, MD, MPhil, MPH, director, melanoma radiation oncology, physician, assistant professor of radiation oncology, Harvard Medical School, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, discusses challenges with immune suppression with radiation and immunotherapy combinations.

Results from the phase II CheckMate-275 trial demonstrated favorable safety and efficacy with the PD-1 inhibitor nivolumab as a second-line treatment for patients with metastatic urothelial cancer who have progressed on first-line chemotherapy.

While immunotherapy is currently only beneficial in select cancers, it is possible for this type of treatment to eventually work for all patients.