PSMA-Targeted Therapies in Clinical Development Show Promise for Prostate Cancer

Naomi Haas, MD, director, Prostate and Kidney Cancer Program, associate professor, Medicine, Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, discusses several areas of interest for the treatment of patients with prostate cancer that are utilizing PSMA, including bispecific T-cell engager (BiTE) antibodies, chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells, and the lutetium studies.

All 3 of these therapeutic strategies are under evaluation clinical trials, but notably, the phase 3 trial of PSMA lutetium, known as the VISION study (NCT03511664), is the closest to reading out. This is a phase 3 study of novel agent 177Lu-PSMA-617 (LuPSMA) as treatment of patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer. Should this agent read out positively, Haas says this may become FDA approved in this setting down the line.

BiTE therapies are still fairly early on, Haas says, and are not done with only PSMA; this can be used with immunotherapies and other agents as well. CAR T trials are early on as well, and again different targets are under evaluation in this arena as well.

Haas concludes these studies are interesting because these are novel agents, not chemotherapies or second-generation androgen therapies.