Ajay K. Nooka, MBBS, of Winship Cancer Center of Emory University, discusses phase II findings showing that, in patients with high-risk myeloma, maintenance therapy with carfilzomib, pomalidomide, and dexamethasone deepened responses. Measurable residual disease negativity was attained in 80% of patients.
Paula Aristizabal, MD, MAS, of the University of California, San Diego, and Rady Children’s Hospital, talks about using a health systems strengthening approach to improve leukemia care and survival in a public Mexican hospital in the region of the border between the United States and Mexico. The demonstrated increase in overall survival across a decade after implementation of the program seems to validate the use of such models, not only to improve clinical outcomes, but also to build sustainable hospital capacity, financially and organizationally (Abstract 1502).
Nagla Abdel Karim, MD, of the Inova Schar Cancer Institute, University of Virginia, discusses phase II data showing that maintenance atezolizumab plus talazoparib improved progression-free survival in Schlafen-11–selected patients with extensive-stage small cell lung cancer. This study demonstrated the feasibility of conducting biomarker-selected trials in this disease, paving the way for future evaluation of novel therapies in selected populations (Abstract 8504).
Narjust Florez, MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and Filippo Gustavo Dall’Olio, MD, of Institut Gustave Roussy, discuss circulating tumor DNA tumor fraction, and its link to survival in patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) treated with maintenance durvalumab in the UNICANCER SAFIR02-Lung/IFCT1301 trial. Tumor fraction was positive in 16% of patients randomly assigned to receive durvalumab in the study. This population seems to have a limited benefit from maintenance durvalumab after induction chemotherapy (Abstract 2516).
Manali K. Kamdar, MD, of University of Colorado Hospital, discusses the treatment landscape for the 30% to 40% of patients with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) whose disease will relapse. Patients who experience relapse within 1 year of chemoimmunotherapy have poor outcomes with autotransplantation, but chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy has shown efficacy and manageable toxicity.
Arlene O. Siefker-Radtke, MD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses phase III findings showing that for patients with advanced or metastatic urothelial carcinoma and FGFR alteration who already had been treated with a PD-(L)1 inhibitor, erdafitinib significantly improved overall and progression-free survival, as well as overall response rate, compared with investigator’s choice of chemotherapy (LBA4619).
