AACR Meeting Highlights

The phase 3 CheckMate-816 trial establishes a new standard of care for resectable non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC): neoadjuvant nivolumab (Opdivo) plus chemotherapy.

A team of researchers in Germany has developed a multipeptide COVID-19 vaccine that boosts immunity in immunocompromised patients, according to results of a phase 1/2 trial reported at the 2022 American Association for Cancer Research annual meeting.

Treatment with tebentafusp (IMCgp100), a novel bispecific T-cell receptor (TCR) fusion protein, extended survival in patients with metastatic uveal melanoma, according to the results from a recent phase 3 trial.

Selpercatinib (Retevmo) demonstrated antitumor activity in RET fusion–positive tumors other than lung cancer and thyroid cancer, according to interim results from the phase 1/2 LIBRETTO-001 clinical trial. Results from the trial were presented by Vivek Subbiah, MD, Medical Director, Clinical Center for Targeted Therapy, The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, at the 2021 virtual American Association for Cancer Research annual meeting.

At the 2020 virtual American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) annual meeting, part I, a team of oncologists from different COVID-19 hotspots around the world gave a snapshot of wisdom gleaned from their experience thus far. Understanding of COVID-19 is rapidly evolving; the summaries below represent the experience as of late April 2020.

A bispecific chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell product directed against CD19 and CD22 antigens induced a complete response (CR) in 5 of 12 (42%) evaluable children and young adults with relapsed or refractory acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL).

The addition of the checkpoint inhibitor atezolizumab (Tecentriq) to the 2 targeted therapies—the BRAF inhibitor vemurafenib (Zelboraf) and the MEK inhibitor cobimetinib (Cotellic)—improved progression-free survival (PFS) and the duration of responses compared with the 2 targeted therapies plus placebo in patients with newly diagnosed advanced melanoma and BRAF V600E/K mutation, according to the phase 3 IMspire150 clinical trial.

Tumors with KRAS mutation are notoriously difficult to treat. Early data presented at the 2020 American Association for Cancer Research virtual annual meeting suggest 2 new routes for the treatment of cancers with KRAS mutation, including (1) the combination of a RAF/MEK inhibitor and a FAK inhibitor, and (2) the use of onvansertib, an investigational competitive inhibitor of the PLK1 enzyme, together with chemotherapy.

Data from the TRACERx lung study suggest that circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) may be a biomarker for the detection of postsurgical minimal residual disease (MRD) in patients with non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), suggesting which patients are at increased risk for disease relapse and will require more aggressive adjuvant therapy.