Dr. George on Efficacy With PD-1 Inhibitor in Uterine Leiomyosarcoma

Suzanne George, MD, assistant professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, clinical director, Center for Sarcoma and Bone Oncology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, discusses a study exploring the efficacy of a PD-1 inhibitor in patients with uterine leiomyosarcoma.

Recently published research was comprised of a collaborative effort between the sarcoma and genomics team at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, which included a patient who achieved an exceptional response to the PD-1 inhibitor pembrolizumab (Keytruda). The patient received pembrolizumab as first-line therapy for metastatic recurrent uterine leiomyosarcoma, and had a dramatic response to the agent in multiple sites of disease—with the exception of a single site.

Researchers were ultimately able to resect that resistance site of disease, she adds. Tissue samples were gathered from her baseline tumor, which had a dramatic response, and the resistant tumor in an attempt to determine the factors for resistance. These 2 differences may help researchers understand why it became resistant.