- The results of two studies that have just been presented at the Congress of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) open the door to new treatment options with anti PD-1 for patients with endometrial cancer and advanced or recurrent cervical cancer which had progressed after a first line of chemotherapy treatment.
Barcelona, September 18, 2020.– The Vall d’Hebron Instituto de Oncología [Vall d’Hebron Institute of Oncology] (VHIO) has played a relevant role in several studies that have thrown up encouraging preliminary results for patients with advanced or recurrent endometrial and cervical cancer.
Dr Ana Oaknin, Head of the at VHIO and Head of the Gynaecological Tumours Programme at the Hospital Universitario Vall d’Hebron [Vall d’Hebron University Hospital], is the first author of the study, Garnet, a phase I study in which dostarlimab (TSR-042), an anti-PD-1 monoclonal antibody, has been administered to patients with advanced or recurrent endometrial cancer whose disease had progressed after receiving a first line of chemotherapy treatment. This study was conducted on two groups of patients: patients with advanced or recurrent endometrial cancer with deficiency in the DNA mismatch repair system (dMMR) and patients with advanced or recurrent endometrial cancer who are DNA mismatch repair proficient (pMMR). Although dostarlimab has shown activity in both groups of patients with remarkable control of the disease, the most significant results (44.7% vs 13.4%) have occurred in the group of patients with dMMR. On the other hand, in the group of pMMR patients, a higher percentage of response was detected in patients with type II endometrial cancer, which is historically associated with a worse prognosis.
“The Garnet study represents the longest series of advanced endometrial cancer patients treated with anti-PD1 to date and opens the door to a new treatment option for these patients without effective treatment after a standard first line of treatment with chemotherapy,” says Dr Ana Oaknin.
Also in the framework of ESMO 2020, Dr Oaknin has participated as a co-author in the article where preliminary results of two independent phase II studies are presented in which treatment with balstilimab, another monoclonal anti-PD1 antibody, has been compared as monotherapy or in combination with zalifrelimab, a CTLA-4 inhibitor in patients with recurrent or metastatic cervical cancer. This trial, the largest reported study of checkpoint inhibitors in this type of cancer, has shown that both treatment options have produced a good response in patients with PDL1 + and PDL1- and that the combination of the two drugs (balstilimab + zalifrelimab) as a single agent increases overall survival with good tolerance by patients. “Currently we do not have a standard treatment for patients with recurrent or metastatic carcinoma of the cervix who have progressed to the platinum-based first line, so these preliminary results show that both treatment with balstilimab and its combination with zalifrelimab can open up a new therapeutic option with immunotherapy as a second line of treatment for this type of cancer,” says Dr Ana Oaknin.
