Evaluating Adjuvant Immunotherapy Use in Resected Stage IB-IIIA NSCLC

Tina Cascone, MD, PhD, assistant professor, in the Department of Thoracic/Head and Neck Medical Oncology, Division of Cancer Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, discusses the basis for conducting the phase 3 IMpower010 study (NCT02486718).

The benefit of immunotherapy administered with or without chemotherapy in patients with advanced metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), as well as in the unresectable locally advanced stage III setting after chemoradiation with durvalumab IMFINZI) has been established in the PACIFIC trial, says Cascone. The treatment improved progression-free survival (PFS) and oncologists have since been eager to learn about the results of immunotherapy testing in the adjuvant setting for patients with resected NSCLC who have received adjuvant chemotherapy.

Those treating patients with NSCLC have also learned about the benefit of immunotherapy from other disease settings, explains Cascone, naming melanoma as an example. Based on these points, she says there is both scientific and clinical rationale for testing these agents in the adjuvant setting.