Dr. Petrylak on the Future Immunotherapy in Bladder Cancer

Daniel Petrylak, MD, Professor of Medicine and of Urology; Professor, Signal Transduction Research Program at Yale Cancer Center discusses the future of immunotherapy in bladder cancer.

There are several immunotherapies being investigated for bladder cancer. The FDA grated breakthrough status to the anti PDL-1 antibody last year. A confirmatory trial has been completed looking at second-line treatment for that therapy, says Peterlak.

A randomized trial of pemobrolizmab versus standard chemotherapy in patients with second-line bladder cancer is also currently underway. In second-line bladder cancer there will hopefully a drug approval in the next year for both of these agents, says Peterlak.

In the first-line setting, immunotherapies are needed for patients that are elderly, frail, or do not have the kidney function to undergo platinum-based therapy. This is being investigated in several phase trials .