Lung Cancer

Though testing for mutations in EGFR, ALK, and ROS1 is a standard approach in patients with non–small cell lung cancer, the same is not true for less common genetic abnormalities, including RET, BRAF, c-MET, and NTRK.

Researchers are exploring VEGF and EGFR inhibitors in combination with other therapies for patients with non–small cell lung cancer in hopes of maximizing clinical outcomes while keeping toxicity levels low.

Treatment with the PD-1 inhibitor nivolumab showed promising results in patients with recurrent malignant pleural mesothelioma.

The field of lung cancer has undoubtedly seen notable advances over the past year—especially with the game-changing November 2016 approval of pembrolizumab for the frontline treatment of patients with non–small cell lung cancer.

Beyond the strong efficacy outcomes observed with single-agent immunotherapies in non–small cell lung cancer—including pembrolizumab, nivolumab, and atezolizumab—the field is now awaiting the next phase: combination regimens.

Tepotinib, an investigational small molecule that targets a recently identified aberration in the MET gene, is moving forward rapidly in clinical development for patients with non–small cell lung cancer who harbor the mutation, raising hopes that a more specific attack on the signaling pathway will lead to a new therapy for a significant subgroup of individuals with the disease.

Determination of the PD-L1 status of a patient’s tumor has become increasingly important for informing the clinical decision whether to offer certain immunotherapeutic agents, making standardization of the tests and antibodies used to determine the PD-L1 status necessary to provide accurate and consistent results.

Durvalumab treatment in the second-line setting or beyond demonstrated clinical benefit and led to durable responses in heavily pretreated patients with locally advanced or metastatic non-small cell lung cancer.

Treatment with the PD-L1 inhibitor atezolizumab significantly improved overall survival compared to standard chemotherapy in patients with non–small lung cancer who progressed on platinum-based chemotherapy.

Patients with non–small cell lung cancer treated in the pembrolizumab arm of the KEYNOTE-024 trial experienced improved quality of life compared with patients who were treated with standard chemotherapy.

Heather Wakelee, MD, medical oncologist, Stanford University Medical Center, discusses a next-generation sequencing platform for the detection of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) EGFR T790M mutation in urine and plasma samples, during an interview at the IASLC 17th World Conference on Lung Cancer in Vienna, Austria.

Suresh S. Ramalingam, MD, professor, Department of Hematology and Medical Oncology, Deputy Director, Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University, discusses the role of osimertinib in the treatment of patients with EGFR T790M-positive advanced non-small cell lung cancer, during an interview at the IASLC 17th World Conference on Lung Cancer in Vienna, Austria.

Osimertinib (Tagrisso) reduced the risk of disease progression by 70% compared with a chemotherapy doublet in patients with EGFR T790M-mutant non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who progressed after first-line targeted therapy.

Frontline treatment with ceritinib (Zykadia) improved progression-free survival over standard chemotherapy in patients with ALK-rearranged non–small cell lung cancer.

Rosalyn Juergens, MD, PhD, assistant professor, Department of Oncology, Division of Medical Oncology, McMaster University, discusses the results of the IND.226 trial, in an interview at the IASLC 17th World Conference on Lung Cancer in Vienna, Austria.

Claire Verschraegen, MD, professor of Medical Oncology, University of Vermont Cancer Center, discusses the results of the JAVELIN Solid Tumor trial during an interview at the IASLC 17th World Conference on Lung Cancer in Vienna, Austria.

Treatment with icotinib more than doubled intracranial progression-free survival compared with whole brain irradiation combined with standard chemotherapy.

Findings from an efficacy update of patients participating in a study in the CheckMate series revealed that first-line nivolumab (Opdivo) demonstrated activity in advanced non–small cell lung cancer, and the addition of ipilimumab (Yervoy) resulted in enhanced activity, specifically in prolonged progression-free survival and higher objective response rates.

Treatment with first-line avelumab yielded promising clinical benefit and durable antitumor activity in patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer.

Joshua Roth, PhD, assistant member, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, discusses the rationale behind the development of a novel risk-prediction algorithm in the context of screening patients for lung cancer. He discussed this during an interview at the IASLC 17th World Conference on Lung Cancer in Vienna, Austria.

Javier Zulueta, MD, head of the Pneumology Department, co-director, Lung Cancer Area, Clinica Universidad de Navarra, discusses the LuCED test, a non-invasive tool used to detect early stage lung cancer, during an interview at the IASLC 17th World Conference on Lung Cancer in Vienna, Austria.

While treatment with nivolumab (Opdivo) significantly improved overall survival over docetaxel in patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer in the CheckMate-057 trial, an analysis of deaths occurring within 3 months of initiation of therapy showed numerically more deaths in the nivolumab arm.

Despite these successes, driver mutations have been identified in only a minority of cases and patients with other types of lung cancer, such as squamous cell carcinoma and small-cell lung cancer, do not currently benefit from targeted therapies.

Scott J. Antonia, MD, PhD, chair of the Department of Thoracic Oncology at Moffit Cancer Center, discusses immunotherapies that are emerging in the field of lung cancer.

Mohammad Jahanzeb, MD, professor of Clinical Medicine, Hematology/Oncology, Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center, University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, discusses the challenges researchers must overcome in patients with non-driver adenocarcinoma.