Current status and future perspective of immune checkpoint inhibitors in colorectal cancer.

Abstract

Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs), as a subverter of immunotherapy in oncology, are changing all aspects of therapy for malignant tumors, especially their remarkable effects on melanoma and non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). For colorectal cancer (CRC), only a small number of patients with high immunogenicity (microsatellite instability-high/mismatch-repair deficient (MSI-H/dMMR)) benefit greatly from ICIs treatment, and most CRC patients with low immunogenicity (microsatellite instability-low/mismatch-repair proficient (MSI-L/pMMR)) do not. Currently, numerous clinical trials are ongoing to improve CRC patients' response to ICIs immunotherapy through better patient selection and novel combination strategies. Thus, this review discusses the current status and latest progress of ICIs treatment in CRC. We expect that these studies can change the pattern of CRC immunotherapy in the future.