Immunotherapy

National Harbor, MD—The investigational CD137 agonist urelumab, given as monotherapy and in combination with the anti–PD-1 monoclonal antibody nivolumab, demonstrated safety and, in some patients with hematologic and solid tumor malignancies, promising antitumor activity, according to results of 2 early-phase studies presented at the 2016 Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer annual meeting.

Washington, DC—The Cancer Moonshot 2020 program is exploring a new paradigm in cancer care by bringing clinical trials focused on immunotherapy to community and academic practices. This privately funded initiative seeks to conduct phase 2 clinical trials within the next 36 months in 20,000 patients with >20 tumor types at all stages of cancer, said Gary Palmer, MD, JD, MPH, Chief Medical Officer, President, GPS Operations, NantHealth, Culver City, CA, at the Sixth Annual Conference of the Association for Value-Based Cancer Care.

Immunotherapy is generating great excitement in melanoma and non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The FDA approvals of checkpoint inhibitors in these tumor types, as well as encouraging preliminary results in other solid tumors, have paved the way for studying these therapies in hematologic cancers.

Vienna, Austria—Immunotherapy is poised to become a game changer for patients with non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

Chicago, IL—Oncologists looking to learn about immunotherapy did not have to go very far at the 2015 American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting. Many of the highest-impact presentations this year, including a plenary session, the Karnofsky Award, and the Science of Oncology Award, focused on cancer therapy’s most exciting field.

Chicago, IL—Immunotherapy with nivolumab (Opdivo) resulted in durable responses and promising overall survival (OS) in a dose-escalation and expansion trial of patients with advanced liver cancer. The 12-month OS rate exceeded 60% in patients in whom sorafenib (Nexavar) had failed, and responses occurred in patients with the hepatitis B virus (HBV) or hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection, reported Anthony B. El-Khoueiry, MD, Assistant Professor of Clinical Medicine, University of Southern California Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center, Los Angeles, at the 2015 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) meeting.

Chicago, IL—Immunotherapy holds promise for the maintenance treatment of late-stage ovarian cancer, according to results of a phase 2 clinical trial. The vaccine, made from the patient’s own tumor cells, was able to prolong recurrence-free survival compared with standard of care.

Oncologists’ excitement about the promise of immunotherapy is about to be tested in clinical practice, with the recent FDA approval of pembrolizumab (Kytruda; Merck), the first anti–programmed death receptor-1 (PD-1) monoclonal antibody