Evaluating PD-L1 Therapy in SCLC
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Ariel Lopez-Chavez, MD, discusses some of the research on evaluating PD-L1 therapy for patients with small cell lung cancer.
Ariel Lopez-Chavez, MD, medical oncologist, director of precision medicine and developmental therapeutics at Allegheny Health Network Cancer Institute, discusses some of the research on evaluating PD-L1 therapy for patients with small cell lung cancer (SCLC).
According to Lopez-Chavez, current research in the SCLC space is focusing on evaluating PD-L1 therapy in the frontline setting. The current FDA-approved options for patients with SCLC include carboplatin or cisplatin with etoposide combined with atezolizumab (Tecentriq) or durvalumab (Imfinzi) followed by maintenance therapy in the frontline setting. In the second-line, lurbinectedin (Zepzelca) and topotecan are approved options.
Transcription:
0:09 | The evolution of PD-L1 therapy has mostly been in the frontline setting. After the approval of atezolizumab and durvalumab in the frontline setting, most of the research has been gravitating around the first-line setting. Essentially, [we are trying] to get all the PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors into that line of therapy. The latest is serplulimab [HLX10], which is a PD-1 inhibitor that recently showed positive results in a phase 3 trial.
1:05 | The other is the combination of other agents in the frontline setting to [see if] the use of PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors are more effective. The trial that is the most advanced…is a phase 3 study [NCT05091567] where lurbinectedin is added to atezolizumab in the maintenance setting for extensive-stage small cell lung cancer. Once these patients fail induction therapy, the carboplatin, etoposide, plus atezolizumab, they get randomized to either continue to receive what atezolizumab as a single-agent maintenance therapy vs atezolizumab and lurbinectedin.
1:52 | This will be an interesting study to see because lurbinectedin is now approved in the second-line setting. It will be interesting to see what the efficacy is bringing it to the maintenance setting. In particular, to see at what cost in regards to the toxicity in the maintenance setting. Then, there are other agents being combined in the frontline setting.
