![]() In a second study, patients with advanced uveal melanoma who had previously received anti-cancer treatment were given IMCgp100 using a different dosing regimen. In one study, IMCgp100 was given to patients with melanoma, including those with advanced uveal melanoma, who had previously received anti-cancer treatment. Carvajal, MD Promising Therapies Under InvestigationĬolumbia faculty presented preliminary results of two studies testing IMCgp100, an experimental immunotherapy, in patients with advanced metastatic uveal melanoma at the annual meeting of the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology. “ A 73 percent one-year overall survival rate in heavily pretreated patients is quite notable, and we are excited about the continued development of IMCgp100 for patients with this disease.” Indeed, the outlook for patients with systemic uveal melanoma is dismal, with a one-year survival rate of approximately 40 percent and with no therapy that has meaningfully improved outcomes - that is, until now. Although current immunotherapies have led to remarkable improvements in the treatment of cutaneous melanoma, researchers have yet to find an effective therapy for patients with metastatic uveal melanoma. While uveal melanoma is considered rare - affecting about 6 per million people in the United States - it is, in fact, the most common primary intraocular malignancy in adults. Pembrolizumab is currently approved for cancer patients with PD-L1-positive recurrent or advanced gastric or gastroesophageal junction adenocarcinoma who have received multiple rounds of chemotherapy, as well as for other cancers, including melanoma, lung, and cervical cancer. Food and Drug Administration to approve the use of this drug in esophageal cancer patients whose disease has progressed after two or more lines of therapy. “ Among the patients who did respond to treatment, some have been without any progression of their cancer for more than a year, which is unheard of.”īased on these results, the Weill Cornell investigators are assisting Merck, which provided pembrolizumab for the trial and funded the study, to petition the U.S. Few patients whose disease progresses after two or more lines of therapy - less than 15 percent of the patients who received first-line therapy - receive additional treatment. First-line therapy calls for conventional chemotherapy, which is largely used to relieve pain, and has sparse evidence of long-term benefit. Metastatic esophageal cancer is a fatal disease with overall survival ranging from 10 to 12 months. Among the patients who did respond to treatment, some have been without any progression of their cancer for more than a year, which the researchers say is unheard of for these patients. Although responses were pronounced in patients with PD-L1-positive tumors, the researchers observed antitumor activity regardless of PD-L1 status, suggesting that pembrolizumab could be effective in a broad range of patients. Treatment with pembrolizumab led to regression of esophageal cancer tumors in 10 percent of all patients and in 14 percent of patients, or 8 of 58, whose tumors expressed the PD-L1 protein. The single-arm clinical trial enrolled 121 patients from 57 sites in 10 countries across the globe. Pembrolizumab belongs to a class of drugs that activates immune cells to attack cancer by blocking the interaction between PD-1, a molecule on immune cells, and PD-L1, a molecule on other cells, including tumor cells. ![]() In the study, published in the December 20, 2018, issue of JAMA Oncology, the investigators report clinical evidence that pembrolizumab (Keytruda) shows promise for treating patients whose disease progressed after receiving two types of combination chemotherapy. The results of a phase 2 clinical trial led by Weill Cornell investigators may offer a new therapeutic approach for some patients with advanced, metastatic esophageal cancer, a population for whom there are currently limited treatment options. Shah, MD, Bartlett Family Associate Professor of Gastrointestinal Oncology Chief, Solid Tumor Service and Director, Gastrointestinal Oncology, NewYork-Presbyterian/ Weill Cornell A Promising Treatment for Esophageal Cancer ![]()
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