RECIST Response Research Articles

Baseline neutrophil-to-eosinophil-ratio and outcome in metastatic clear-cell renal cell carcinoma treated with nivolumab or ipilimumab/nivolumab.

This study aims to evaluate neutrophil-to-eosinophil ratio (NER) as a prognostic and/or predictive biomarker in metastatic clear cell renal cell carcinoma (m-ccRCC) treated with nivolumab or ipilimumab/nivolumab. We performed a retrospective study on m-ccRCC patients treated with nivolumab or ipilimumab/nivolumab (2012-2022). Baseline NER was calculated and correlated with clinical outcomes: response rate (RR), progression free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS). Corresponding transcriptomic data were analysed. We included 201 m-ccRCC patients, 76 treated with ipilimumab/nivolumab and 125 with nivolumab. Baseline NER was statistically significantly associated with International Metastatic RCC Database Consortium (IMDC) risk groups. Increased NER was associated with shorter PFS and OS in the total patient series and nivolumab-treated patients. In patients treated with ipilimumab/nivolumab, increased NER was only statistically significantly associated with shorter OS. The impact of baseline NER on PFS and OS was independent of IMDC risk stratification. No clear correlation was found between baseline NER and RECIST response or maximal tumour shrinkage. In two additional databases, NER was also associated with PFS and OS in first-line vascular-endothelial-growth-factor-receptor tyrosine-kinase-inhibitors (VEGFR-TKIs), but not to disease-free survival in the post-nephrectomy setting. Lower NER was associated with intratumoural molecular features possibly associated with better outcome on immune checkpoint inhibitors. Lower baseline NER is associated with better PFS and OS, independent of IMDC risk score, in m-ccRCC patients treated with ipilimumab/nivolumab or nivolumab. It correlates with intratumoural molecular features possibly associated with better outcome on immune checkpoint inhibitors. The predictive power of this biomarker is probably limited and insufficient for patient selection.

Gynecologic Cancer InterGroup CA125 response has a high negative predictive value for CHK1 inhibitor RECIST response in recurrent ovarian cancer

We investigated the association of CA125 response with prognosis and RECIST response/progressive disease (PD) criteria in recurrent high grade serous ovarian cancer (HGSOC) patients treated with a cell cycle checkpoint kinase 1 inhibitor (CHK1i), prexasertib. 81 patients had measurable disease per RECISTv1.1, of which 72 and 70 were measurable by Gynecologic Cancer InterGroup (GCIG) CA125 response and PD criteria, respectively. Univariate and multivariate analyses showed that GCIG CA125 response (n = 32) is associated with improved progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) compared to no GCIG CA125 response (n = 40) (median PFS 8.0 vs. 3.5 months [HR: 0.30, 95% CI: 0.18–0.51, p < 0.0001]; median OS 19.8 vs. 10.0 months [HR: 0.38, 95% CI: 0.23–0.64, p < 0.001]) independent of BRCA mutation status, platinum-sensitivity, previous PARP inhibitor therapy, ECOG performance status, and FIGO stage. Notably, GCIG CA125 response had a high negative predictive value (NPV: 93%, 95% CI: 80–98), but poor positive predictive value (PPV: 53%, 95% CI: 35–71) in predicting RECIST response. CA125 PD criteria also showed poor concordance with RECIST PD (PPV 56%, 95% CI: 40–71; NPV 33%, 95% CI: 17–54). Therefore, serum CA125 may be useful as a highly accessible prognostic and predictive biomarker to CHK1i therapy in recurrent HGSOC.

Microsatellite Instability, Tumor Mutational Burden, and Response to Immune Checkpoint Blockade in Patients with Prostate Cancer.

Patients with microsatellite instability-high/mismatch repair-deficient (MSI-H/dMMR) and high tumor mutational burden (TMB-H) prostate cancers are candidates for pembrolizumab. We define the genomic features, clinical course, and response to immune checkpoint blockade (ICB) in patients with MSI-H/dMMR and TMB-H prostate cancers without MSI [TMB-H/microsatellite stable (MSS)]. We sequenced 3,244 tumors from 2,257 patients with prostate cancer. MSI-H/dMMR prostate cancer was defined as an MSIsensor score ≥10 or MSIsensor score ≥3 and <10 with a deleterious MMR alteration. TMB-H was defined as ≥10 mutations/megabase. PSA50 and RECIST responses were assigned. Overall survival and radiographic progression-free survival (rPFS) were compared using log-rank test. Sixty-three (2.8%) men had MSI-H/dMMR, and 33 (1.5%) had TMB-H/MSS prostate cancers. Patients with MSI-H/dMMR and TMB-H/MSS tumors more commonly presented with grade group 5 and metastatic disease at diagnosis. MSI-H/dMMR tumors had higher TMB, indel, and neoantigen burden compared with TMB-H/MSS. Twenty-seven patients with MSI-H/dMMR and 8 patients with TMB-H/MSS tumors received ICB, none of whom harbored polymerase epsilon (polE) catalytic subunit mutations. About 45% of patients with MSI-H/dMMR had a RECIST response, and 65% had a PSA50 response. No patient with TMB-H/MSS had a RECIST response, and 50% had a PSA50 response. rPFS tended to be longer in patients with MSI-H/dMMR than in patients with TMB-H/MSS who received immunotherapy. Pronounced differences in genomics, TMB, or MSIsensor score were not detected between MSI-H/dMMR responders and nonresponders. MSI-H/dMMR prostate cancers have greater TMB, indel, and neoantigen burden than TMB-H/MSS prostate cancers, and these differences may contribute to profound and durable responses to ICB.

Clinical Validation of Mathematically Derived Early Tumor Dynamics for Solid Tumors in Response to Durvalumab.

Early prediction of response to immunotherapy may help guide patient management by identifying resistance to treatment and allowing adaptation of therapies. This analysis evaluated a mathematical model of response to immunotherapy that provides patient-specific prediction of outcome using the initial change in tumor size/burden from baseline to the first follow-up visit on standard imaging scans. We applied the model to 600 patients with advanced solid tumors who received durvalumab in Study 1108, a phase I/II trial, and compared outcome prediction performance versus size-based criteria with RECIST version 1.1 best overall response (BOR), baseline circulating tumor (ct)DNA level, and other clinical/pathologic predictors of immunotherapy response. In multiple solid tumors, the mathematical parameter representing net tumor growth rate at the first on-treatment computed tomography (CT) scan assessed around 6 weeks after starting durvalumab (α1) had a concordance index to predict overall survival (OS) of 0.66-0.77 on multivariate analyses. This measurement of early tumor dynamics significantly improved multivariate OS models that included standard RECIST v1.1 criteria, baseline ctDNA levels, and other clinical/pathologic factors in predicting OS. Furthermore, α1 was assessed consistently at the first on-treatment CT scan, whereas all traditional RECIST BOR groups were confirmed only after this time. These results support further exploring α1 as an integral biomarker of response to immunotherapy. This biomarker may be predictive of further benefit and can be assessed before RECIST response groups can be assigned, potentially providing an opportunity to personalize oncologic management.

Management and outcomes for older women with early breast cancer treated with primary endocrine therapy (PET)

BackgroundThis study reports the detailed management and outcomes of women treated with Primary Endocrine Therapy (PET) in a large prospective UK cohort of older women (≥70) with breast cancer. MethodsThis was an unplanned secondary analysis of a prospective, multicentre, observational study (The Age Gap study). Data were collected at baseline and regular intervals on patient, tumour and treatment characteristics with tumour RECIST response category recorded. Direct study follow-up was 24 months with longer-term survival data obtained from the UK cancer registry. ResultsThe Age Gap study recruited 3316 women across 56 breast units. Primary endocrine therapy (PET) was initiated for 505/3316 (15 %) women; median age was 84 (IQR 79–88) with median follow-up 41.9 months (IQR 27–60). Death occurred in 205/505(40.6 %) patients, 160/205; 78 % non- Breast Cancer related, 45/205; 21.9 % Breast Cancer related. Multivariate analysis identified older age (HR-1.055(95 % Confidence Interval: 1.029–1.084); P < 0.001) and higher Charlson Index (HR-1.166 (1.086–1.252); P < 0.001) as risk factors for all-cause mortality, but conversion to surgery (HR-0.372(0.152–0.914); P = 0.031) was protective. Grade 3 cancer (G1 vs G3 HR-0.28 (0.094–0.829); P = 0.022 & G2 vs G3 HR-0.469 (0.226–0.973); P = 0.042), axillary positivity (axilla positivity HR-2.548 (1.321–4.816); P = 0.005) and change of endocrine therapy (HR-3.010 (1.532–5.913); P = 0.001) were associated with worse breast cancer specific survival (BCSS). RECIST category was not significantly associated with either overall survival or BCSS (P > 0.05). ConclusionEarly disease response and change of endocrine therapy are not significantly associated with overall survival, conversion to surgery is linked to improved outcome. Prognosis is largely determined by age and comorbidity in older women treated with PET.

Reliability of Magseed® marking before neoadjuvant systemic therapy with subsequent contrast-enhanced mammography in patients with non-palpable breast cancer lesions after treatment: the MAGMA study

PurposeTo assess the reliability of excising residual breast cancer lesions after neoadjuvant systemic therapy (NAST) using a previously localized paramagnetic seed (Magseed®) and the subsequent use of contrast-enhanced spectral mammography (CESM) to evaluate response.MethodsObservational, prospective, multicenter study including adult women (> 18 years) with invasive breast carcinoma undergoing NAST between January 2022 and February 2023 with non-palpable tumor lesions at surgery. Radiologists marked tumors with Magseed® during biopsy before NAST, and surgeons excised tumors guided by the Sentimag® magnetometer. CESMs were performed before and after NAST to evaluate tumor response (Response Evaluation Criteria for Solid Tumors [RECIST]). We considered intraoperative, surgical, and CESM-related variables and histological response.ResultsWe analyzed 109 patients (median [IQR] age of 55.0 [46.0, 65.0] years). Magseed® was retrieved from breast tumors in all surgeries (100%; 95% CI 95.47–100.0%) with no displacement and was identified by radiology in 106 patients (97.24%), a median (IQR) of 176.5 (150.0, 216.3) days after marking. Most surgeries (94.49%) were conservative; they lasted a median (IQR) of 22.5 (14.75, 40.0) min (95% CI 23.59–30.11 min). Most dissected tumor margins (93.57%) were negative, and few patients (5.51%) needed reintervention. Magseed® was identified using CESM in all patients (100%); RECIST responses correlated with histopathological evaluations of dissected tumors using the Miller–Payne response grade (p < 0.0001) and residual lesion diameter (p < 0.0001). Also 69 patients (63.3%) answered a patient’s satisfaction survey and 98.8% of them felt very satisfied with the entire procedure.ConclusionLong-term marking of breast cancer lesions with Magseed® is a reliable and feasible method in patients undergoing NAST and may be used with subsequent CESM.

Stereotactic Body Radiotherapy and Liver Transplant for Liver Cancer

Whether stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) as a bridge to liver transplant for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is effective and safe is still unknown. To investigate the feasibility of SBRT before deceased donor liver transplant (DDLT) for previously untreated unresectable HCC. In this phase 2 nonrandomized controlled trial conducted between June 1, 2015, and October 18, 2019, 32 eligible patients within UCSF (University of California, San Francisco) criteria underwent dual-tracer (18F-fluorodeoxyglucose and 11C-acetate [ACC]) positron emission tomography with computed tomography (PET-CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) with gadoxetate followed by SBRT of 35 to 50 Gy in 5 fractions, and the same imaging afterward while awaiting DDLT. Statistical analysis was performed on an intention-to-treat basis between October 1 and 31, 2023. Patients received SBRT followed by DDLT when matched deceased donor grafts were available. Coprimary end points were progression-free survival (PFS) and objective response rates (ORRs) by the Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors, version 1.1 (RECIST 1.1), modified RECIST (mRECIST), and PET Response Criteria in Solid Tumors (PERCIST). Secondary end points were local control rate, overall survival (OS), and safety. A total of 32 patients (median age, 59 years [IQR, 54-63 years]; 22 men [68.8%]) with 56 lesions received SBRT. After a median follow-up of 74.6 months (IQR, 40.1-102.9 months), the median PFS was 17.6 months (95% CI, 6.6-28.6 months), and the median OS was 60.5 months (95% CI, 29.7-91.2 months). The 5-year PFS was 39.9% (95% CI, 19.9%-59.9%), and the 5-year OS was 51.3% (95% CI, 31.7%-70.9%). In terms of number of patients, ORRs were 62.5% ([n = 20] 95% CI, 54.2%-68.7%) by RECIST 1.1, 71.9% ([n = 23] 95% CI, 63.7%-79.0%) by mRECIST, and 78.1% ([n = 25] 95% CI, 73.2%-86.7%) by PERCIST. In terms of number of lesions, ORRs were 75.0% ([n = 42] 95% CI, 61.6%-80.8%) by RECIST 1.1, 83.9% ([n = 47] 95% CI, 74.7%-90.6%) by mRECIST, and 87.5% ([n = 49] 95% CI, 81.3%-98.6%) by PERCIST. Twenty patients with 36 lesions received DDLT, of whom 15 patients (75.0%) with 21 lesions (58.3%) exhibited pathologic complete response. Multivariable analyses revealed that pretreatment metabolic tumor volume (MTV) based on ACC (hazard ratio [HR], 1.06 [95% CI, 1.01-1.10]; P = .01) and complete metabolic response (CMR) by PERCIST (HR, 0.31 [95% CI, 0.10-0.96]; P = .04) were associated with PFS, while pretreatment MTV based on ACC (HR, 1.07 [95% CI, 1.03-1.16]; P = .01), total lesion activity based on ACC (HR, 1.01 [95% CI, 1.00-1.02]; P = .02), and CMR by PERCIST (HR, 0.21 [95% CI, 0.07-0.73]; P = .01) were associated with OS. Toxic effects associated with SBRT were reported for 9 patients (28.1%), with 1 grade 3 event. This phase 2 nonrandomized controlled trial demonstrated promising survival and safety outcomes of SBRT before DDLT for unresectable HCC. Future randomized clinical trials are warranted.

Interleukin-6 receptor blockade with tocilizumab to reduce immune-related toxicity with ipilimumab and nivolumab in metastatic melanoma.

9538 Background: Interleukin-6(IL-6) blockade has reversed steroid-refractory immune-related toxicity in patients receiving immune checkpoint blockade (ICB). IL-6 and its downstream acute phase reactants are also associated with short survival and therapeutic resistance in patients receiving single agent or combination ICB. We undertook a phase II trial of IPI, NIVO and the IL-6 receptor blocking antibody tocilizumab (TOCI) in unresectable melanoma. Methods: In a phase II, Simon-design two-stage trial, 70 patients with untreated metastatic melanoma received IPI at 1 mg/kg and NIVO at 3 mg/kg for 4 induction doses to week 12, and TOCI at 4 mg/kg every 6 weeks up to week 24. Maintenance NIVO was administered at 240 mg intravenously (IV) from weeks 12 to 24, then at a dose of 480 mg IV every 4 weeks for up to 2 years of treatment. To proceed past the first stage of 18 patients, 12/18 RECIST responses or more and/or a grade 3-5 treatment related immune-related adverse event (irAE) rate of ≤5/18 were required. Those criteria were both fulfilled, and in the second stage 49 patients were treated, with 3 additional patients accrued. Serum and peripheral blood samples were collected for biomarker assays at baseline and week 7. Results: There were 40/70 RECIST responders with a 57% best overall response rate (BORR), (exact 95% confidence interval (CI) of 44-68%) of partial response (PR) or complete response (CR); 6 patients had stable disease (SD), 24 with progression, at a median of 2.4 years of follow-up. A total of 46 patients had clinical benefit (CR+PR+SD) = 65% (exact 95% CI 37-81%). Median progression-free survival was 13 months. The expected BORR was 47% in the randomized Checkmate-511 trial at the same doses of IPI/NIVO. There have been 16 cases of grades 3-4 irAE including 3 episodes of colitis for a total of 16/71 patients eligible for toxicity = 22% (exact 95% CI: 12-31%), all grade 3/4; the expected rate of grades 3-5 TRAEs was 34% per Checkmate-511. The rate of irAE leading to discontinuation was 14%; it was 25% for CheckMate 511. Twenty-one deaths (30%) occurred, all due to progression. All grade 3-4 irAES were reversible and no grade 5 toxicity was seen. Osteopontin+IL6+CD45RAnegclassical monocytes were associated with response, and higher levels of naive CD8 T cells were associated with progression. CD16+CD56+CD57+ mature natural killer cells were significantly lower in patients with grade 3-4 immune-related toxicity. Conclusions: Prophylactic TOCI resulted in a low rate of grade 3-4 irAEs by week 24 in patients with stage IV melanoma receiving induction IPI 1 mg/kg and NIVO 3 mg/kg while maintaining a favorable overall response rate and survival. Novel biomarkers of response and toxicity including NK cells and monocytes as well as naïve and effector memory CD8 T cells were defined by high-resolution flow cytometry. Additional correlative data will be presented. Clinical trial information: NCT03999749 .

A biomarker-directed, multi-center phase II/III study of ctDNA molecular response adaptive immuno-chemotherapy in patients with non-small cell lung cancer.

TPS8669 Background: Liquid biopsy analyses of circulating cell-free tumor DNA (ctDNA) have shown promise as an early endpoint of immunotherapy response, allowing patients with primary resistance to be rapidly and accurately identified. BR.36 is a ctDNA-directed, phase II/III trial of molecular response-adaptive immuno-chemotherapy; in the first of two independent stages, the BR.36 trial met its primary endpoint, with a sensitivity of ctDNA response for radiographic RECIST response of 82% and a specificity of 75%, while demonstrating a median time to ctDNA response of 2.1 months. Additionally, patients with ctDNA molecular response attained longer progression-free (PFS) and overall survival (OS). Methods: The second stage of BR.36 is a multi-center, biomarker-directed, phase II/III clinical trial of ctDNA molecular response adaptive immuno-chemotherapy in patients with immunotherapy and chemotherapy-naïve metastatic NSCLC. The main objective is to evaluate if adding chemotherapy to pembrolizumab for patients who have persistent ctDNA on liquid biopsy drawn after 6 weeks of treatment will result in better PFS and OS compared to patients who remain on pembrolizumab until clinical progression. Key eligibility criteria include: age ≥18 years, ECOG performance status 0-2, metastatic NSCLC, EGFR and ALK mutation negative and PD-L1 Tumor Proportion Score (TPS) ≥ 50%, at least and not more than 2 cycles of the 200 mg or 2 mg/kg IV Q3W of pembrolizumab as first line systemic immunotherapy at the time of screening and RECIST non-PD or clinically stable PD documented prior to enrolment that can continue on immunotherapy. The phase II primary endpoint is PFS and has secondary endpoints of feasibility, overall response rate and safety/tolerability. Sex, RECIST response and ECOG status represent stratification criteria. With 110 randomized patients evaluable for progression (55 patients per arm and 71 PFS events observed in this phase), we would be able to detect a hazard ratio difference of 0.67 with a 1-sided alpha of 0.2 and power of 0.80 using a phase II screening design. The trial will not stop accrual for the phase II analysis of PFS if feasibility endpoints are achieved. In the phase III portion, a total of 210 randomized patients recruited over 3 years and followed for an additional 24 months are required to detect an OS hazard ratio difference of 0.67 with 1-sided alpha of 0.05 and power of 0.8. The total number of events for the final analysis is 156, and assuming 10% of patients are lost to follow-up, we are targeting 230 patients to be included overall. The primary endpoint of the phase III portion is OS, with secondary endpoints of best overall response, response duration, PFS and safety/tolerability. Exploratory endpoints include longitudinal ctDNA analyses. The BR.36 clinical trial is open to enrollment (ClinicalTrials.gov ID: NCT04093167). Clinical trial information: NCT04093167 .

Extracting Systemic Anticancer Therapy and Response Information From Clinical Notes Following the RECIST Definition.

The RECIST guidelines provide a standardized approach for evaluating the response of cancer to treatment, allowing for consistent comparison of treatment efficacy across different therapies and patients. However, collecting such information from electronic health records manually can be extremely labor-intensive and time-consuming because of the complexity and volume of clinical notes. The aim of this study is to apply natural language processing (NLP) techniques to automate this process, minimizing manual data collection efforts, and improving the consistency and reliability of the results. We proposed a complex, hybrid NLP system that automates the process of extracting, linking, and summarizing anticancer therapy and associated RECIST-like responses from narrative clinical text. The system consists of multiple machine learning-/deep learning-based and rule-based modules for diverse NLP tasks such as named entity recognition, assertion classification, relation extraction, and text normalization, to address different challenges associated with anticancer therapy and response information extraction. We then evaluated the system performances on two independent test sets from different institutions to demonstrate its effectiveness and generalizability. The system used domain-specific language models, BioBERT and BioClinicalBERT, for high-performance therapy mentions identification and RECIST responses extraction and categorization. The best-performing model achieved a 0.66 score in linking therapy and RECIST response mentions, with end-to-end performance peaking at 0.74 after relation normalization, indicating substantial efficacy with room for improvement. We developed, implemented, and tested an information extraction system from clinical notes for cancer treatment and efficacy assessment information. We expect this system will support future cancer research, particularly oncologic studies that focus on efficiently assessing the effectiveness and reliability of cancer therapeutics.

Association of combination tumor texture and vessel tortuosity with progression free survival across PD-L1 subgroups in durvalumab treated non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC): Blinded validation results from CP1108.

8600 Background: Immunotherapy (IO) has shown a durable response with minimal toxicity in the treatment of metastatic NSCLC. However, only 30-50% of these patients (pts) actually respond. Despite initial optimism surrounding PD-L1 expression as a potential biomarker, IO provides benefit across PD-L1 low (&lt;25%) and high (≥25%) status. This highlights a critical need for more effective biomarkers to guide treatment decisions. Here, we present blinded validation results of a CT-based biomarker of change in quantitative vessel tortuosity (1) (Δ-QVT) and texture radiomics (2) (Δ-Rad) between baseline (B) and 6 weeks post-treatment (TP1) for predicting response, overall survival (OS) and progression free survival (PFS) in CP1108 (NCT01693562). Methods: CT scans at B and TP1 were retrospectively analyzed from two studies (a) a multi-center training set (Str, N=110) of metastatic NSCLC pts treated with first line IO and (b) a blinded NSCLC cohort of N = 151 pts treated with Durvalumab in CP1108 study (Sv). In Sv, N=75 pts were PD-L1 high (Sv+) whereas N=65 pts were PD-L1 low (Sv-). An in-house MATLAB based algorithm was used to extract intra-tumoral, peri-tumoral texture and QVT features from up to two largest measurable tumors in each CT. A classifier (MCombo) was trained on Str to predict best overall response defined as per the RECIST v1.1 criteria using combination of Δ-QVT and Δ-Rad features. Area under the receiver operating characteristic (AUC) was used to evaluate MCombo against RECIST response whereas univariable and multivariable Cox regression models with log-rank test, hazard ratio (HR) with confidence interval (CI) and concordance index (C-index) were used to study the association of MCombo with OS and PFS in Sv, Sv+, and Sv-. Results: MCombo predicted objective response with an AUC of 0.78 in Sv and was statistically significantly associated with PFS (Table) in Sv, Sv+, and Sv-. MCombo was associated with OS in Sv, Sv+, but not in Sv-. Multivariable analysis with PD-L1 status, histological subtype, ECOG status, liver metastasis, line of therapy and sex showed independent association of MCombo across OS and PFS. Conclusions: Our results indicate that combination of radiomics and vessel tortuosity biomarker from CT is independently prognostic of response and PFS across PD-L1 levels. Prospective validation of this biomarker is needed. 1. Alilou et al. Sci Adv 2022. 2. Khorrami et al. Cancer Immunol Res 2020. [Table: see text]

Lenvatinib, gemcitabine, and oxaliplatin for 67 patients with fibrolamellar carcinoma.

e16151 Background: Fibrolamellar Carcinoma (FLC) is a rare form of primary liver cancer affecting teenagers and young adults without any underlying liver disease. It typically presents at an advanced stage with a mix of symptoms attributed to other causes. Currently R0 resection is the only cure. One-half of patients are unresectable at presentation with short life expectancies. An effective neoadjuvant therapy that could increase resectable patients and a sustained response. Although a few FLC-specific clinical trials have been ongoing for several years, there are no published results yet, nor expected for several years. Gemcitabine-oxaliplatin-lenvatinib (GOL) was selected based on case reports of GO success and trials using GO with sorafenib (SOR), but with LEN substituted for SOR based on superior efficacy and lower toxicity. This the largest cohort of FLC patients receiving the same systemic therapy reported. Methods: After approval (#IRB00003999) and consent (NCT03793088), data was collected on all GOL subjects from April 15, 2019 to Jan. 31, 2024. Response was measured using RECIST 1.1 and volume estimates. Results: Sixty-five GOL courses, 60 patients (30F), 5 retreated, median age at diagnosis/start of GOL (19/21), 58 unresectable, previous surgeries/relapses/therapies (1/2/2), stage I/II/III/IV (0/1/4/60) were given GOL cycles (median 10) of G:1000mg/m2,O:100mg/m2,L:8mg daily, 98% neoadjuvantly. Excluding the 14 on GOL, 3 with planned and 3 who refused surgery, 28 of 39 (72%) have had surgery (R0=20, R2=6, transplant=2), leaving 11 still unresectable. Twelve had &gt; 6 lymph nodes examined with 75% showing &lt; 1 positive for microscopic disease. The median time to best response was 4.7 months and 9.8 cycles with RECIST and volume best responses of: -21% and -41%. Complete/partial/stable/progressive responses by RECIST and volume were 1/12/45/1 and 2/18/38/1, for an overall response/disease control rate of: 22% / 98% and 34%/97%. Circulating DNA prospectively followed had an average drop of -93%, with one-third achieving 0.0 at completion of GOL. The 6,12,18 and 24 month overall survival from the start of GOL is (%): 97/87/73/65. To date, 38 have failed GOL, including: death (37%), infection (5%), or alive post relapse (19%) at a median time from start of GOL of 12 months. Although these are high-risk patients (median 3 relapses) 67% had their longest disease-free interval. The most common toxicities were neuropathy (39%), cytopenias (10%), and nausea (10%), mostly (95%) NIH grade 1 or 2. Conclusions: Our retrospective study of high-risk FLC, most multiply relapsed, pretreated, stage 4 and unresectable, showed that a prolonged and meaningful clinical response and acceptable quality of life with a chance for curative surgery is possible for many young patients thought to be incurable. Prospective trials are needed to confirm these results.

Survival outcomes of patients with extensive-stage small cell lung cancer who received treatment with atezolizumab in combination with carboplatin and etoposide: A propensity score adjusted cohort study.

8096 Background: Small cell lung cancer (SCLC) is an aggressive type of lung cancer. Most patients (pts) are diagnosed with extensive-stage disease (ES-SCLC). The cornerstone treatment of ES-SCLC has been platinum-based chemotherapy and etoposide. Combining atezolizumab with carboplatin plus etoposide (Carbo-E) improved overall survival (OS) in ES-SCLC pts and became a new standard for first-line treatment. However, there is a paucity of real-world outcomes in ES-SCLC. Herein, we present the largest and longest follow-up retrospective study analyzing atezolizumab in combination with chemotherapy for treatment of ES-SCLC. Methods: We conducted a retrospective study and included all adult pts (≥ 18 years) with ES-SCLC treated at Cleveland Clinic between 1/2010-12/2022. ES-SCLC was defined as stage IIIB or stage IV. We collected treatment regimens and baseline characteristics including age, sex, race, smoking, alcohol intake history, and comorbidities. Responses were assessed using RECIST response criteria. Both OS and progression-free survival (PFS) were calculated from treatment initiation. We used propensity score (PS) weighting and multivariable Cox proportional hazards ratio (CPH) to adjust for baseline confounding. Results: We identified 561 ES-SCLC pts who received treatment, 375 (67%) received Carbo-E and 160 (29%) received Carbo-E + Atezolizumab (Carbo-E-Atezo). The table describes the baseline characteristics of Carbo-E and Carbo-E-Atezo groups. The median follow-up was 30 months (mo) (IQR: 14 - 59). In the Carbo-E arm, 45 patients (12%) received second-line immune therapy (nivolumab +/- ipilimumab or pembrolizumab). On PS-adjusted logistic regression, pts who received Carbo-E-Atezo had a 1.1 odds ratio (95%CI: 0.85-1.43, P&gt;0.05) to respond compared to pts who received Carbo-E. There was no difference in PS-adjusted median OS between pts who received Carbo-E-Atezo (9.2 mo (95%CI: 8.1-11)) vs. Carbo-E (8.4 mo (95%CI: 7.7-9.0)) (log-rank P&gt;0.05). Similarly, there was no difference in adjusted median PFS between pts who received Carbo-E-Atezo (5.9 mo (95%CI: 5.3-6.9)) vs. Carbo-E (5.5 mo (95%CI: 4.7-5.9)) (P&gt;0.05). Using CPH model, the addition of atezolizumab to Carbo-E did not decrease mortality (Hazard Ratio: 0.84, 95%CI: 0.68-1.04, P&gt;0.05). Male gender and increasing age were predictors of worse OS (P&lt;0.05). Conclusions: Among pts with ES-SCLC, the addition of atezolizumab to the standard chemotherapy regimen of Carbo-E showed no significant difference in PFS or OS in our real-world study. [Table: see text]

Human-AI teams to improve accuracy and timeliness of oncology trial prescreening: Preplanned interim analysis of a randomized trial.

1524 Background: Identifying eligible patients for oncology clinical trials (“prescreening”) relies on manual chart review by clinical research coordinators (CRCs), which is time-consuming and often inaccurate. Consequently, 70% of patients with cancer who meet trial eligibility criteria are not offered participation. Natural language processing (NLP) may improve the accuracy and timeliness of prescreening. Methods: This was a preplanned interim analysis of a paired-design noninferiority trial, powered to assess timeliness. We adapted NLP algorithms to identify 13 common eligibility criteria related to cancer type/stage, prior systemic therapy, actionable biomarkers, and response criteria. NLP systems performed optical character recognition, entity and relationship extraction, and natural language inference through deep learning and symbolic AI techniques. Deidentified unstructured electronic health records (EHRs) from real-world patients with non-small cell lung (NSCLC) or colorectal (CrCa) cancer were presented to CRCs via a secure platform. Two CRCs were randomized 1:1 to view blocks of 20 charts each with (Human+AI) or without (Human-alone) NLP annotations. In pre-trial assessment, the CRCs had 86% inter-rater agreement. The primary outcome was overall chart-level accuracy, defined as percent of the 13 CRC-coded eligibility items matching a gold standard set, determined by 2-3 clinicians blinded to experimental arms. Paired t-tests compared overall accuracy (noninferiority margin 5%) and criteria-specific accuracy. Significant differences were assessed for superiority using two-sided paired t-tests. Mann-Whitney tests compared the secondary outcome of timeliness (time per chart review). Results: Among 74 (40 NSCLC; 34 CrCa) of a planned 400 patients, overall accuracy for Human+AI was noninferior to Human-alone (78.7% vs. 76.7%, mean difference 2.0%, p&lt;0.001 rejecting inferiority); both were greater than AI-alone (63.5%). Superiority for Human+AI was demonstrated for RECIST response, but not for overall nor other criteria-specific accuracy (Table). Median time per review was lower for Human+AI than Human-alone (34.1 vs 43.9 min, adjusted p=0.05). Conclusions: Human+AI teams can improve timeliness of trial prescreening with noninferior accuracy. This platform is being used for eligibility assessment in an ongoing clinical trial. [Table: see text]

Standardizing radiologic reporting of response to improve the patient experience: Comparing response categories of RECIST 1.1 and a novel, real-world, standardized, oncologic response lexicon derived from clinical radiology reports.

e13810 Background: With the 21st Century Cures Act of 2016, rapid and complete access to medical records including radiology reports is mandated. Patients have expressed that an unmet need is improving clarity in radiology results with more structured information that avoids technical jargon. RECIST is routinely applied in clinical trials to assess treatment response but is challenging to apply in routine practice. A standardized Oncologic Response (OR) lexicon was developed to categorize response and progression directly from clinical reports, using an ordinal scale. This study aims to compare the rates of response from OR categories to RECIST categories in the setting of three phase 2 trials. Methods: Patients from three phase 2 trials were retrospectively reviewed for real world response using OR categories by a radiologist blinded to RECIST data. Clinical radiology reports generated during the trial period were reviewed and response was categorized from the report impression text according to OR categories (OR-0: no evidence of disease, OR-1: unequivocal decrease, OR-2: slight decrease, OR-3: unchanged, OR-4: slight increase, and OR-5: unequivocal increase). Best RECIST response categories of complete response (CR) or partial response (PR), stable disease (SD), and progression of disease (PD) were compared to best OR response categories (OR-0/1, OR-2/3/4, and OR-5, respectively). Time to treatment failure (TTF) and overall survival (OS) for each category was calculated using Kaplan-Meier methodology. Results: Ninety-one patients were reviewed. Best response based on RECIST v1.1 was CR for 4 patients (4%), PR for 38 patients (42%), SD for 44 patients (48%), and PD for 5 patients (6%). Using OR-categories, 1 patient (1%) was categorized as OR-0, 46 (51%) as OR-1, 34 (37%) OR-2/3/4, and 10 (11%) OR-5. Concordance between the three response categories across RECIST (CR or PR; SD; PD) and OR-RADS (0-1; 2/3/4; 5) was 73.6%. The majority of discordant cases (50%, n=12/24) were patients with SD by RECIST but OR-1 using OR categories. Median TTF was similar between RECIST and OR categories: RECIST CR/PR: 21.8, SD: 6.9, and PD: 1.0 months (p&lt;0.0001) and OR-0/1: 21.5, OR-2/3/4: 7.0, and OR-5 1.1 (p&lt;0.0001). Median OS was similar between RECIST and OR-categories: RECIST CR/PR: 42.6, SD: 9.9, and PD: 8.2 months (p=0.005) and OR-0/1: 42.6, OR-2/3/4: 13.6, and OR-5 7.1 (p&lt;0.0001). Conclusions: There was high concordance between RECIST and OR-categories. This study provides preliminary evidence for the use of standardized OR categories to identify real world responses, with outcomes similar to RECIST response categories. Use of OR can improve communication with patients and oncologists and allow for standardized data extraction of radiologic response for real-world studies.

Entinostat in patients with relapsed or refractory abdominal neuroendocrine tumors.

Gastroenteropancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (GEP-NETs) are rare neoplasms with an increasing annual incidence and prevalence. Many are metastatic at presentation or recur following surgical resection and require systemic therapy, for which somatostatin analogs such as octreotide or lanreotide comprise typical first-line therapies. Nonetheless, treatment options remain limited. Epigenetic processes such as histone modifications have been implicated in malignant transformation and progression. In this study, we evaluated the anti-proliferative effects of a histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitor, entinostat, which was computationally predicted to show anti-cancer activity, as confirmed in in vitro and in vivo models of GEP-NETs. This was a phase II study to evaluate the efficacy and safety of entinostat in patients with relapsed or refractory abdominal NETs. The primary objective was to estimate the objective response rate to entinostat. Additionally, with each patient as his/her own control we estimated the rates of tumor growth prior to enrollment on study and while receiving entinostat. Patients received 5 mg entinostat weekly until disease progression or intolerable toxicity. The dose could be changed to 10 mg biweekly for patients who did not experience grade ≥ 2 treatment-related adverse events (AEs) in cycle 1, but was primarily administered at the starting 5 mg weekly dose. The study enrolled only 5 patients due to early termination by the drug sponsor. The first patient that enrolled had advanced disease and died within days of enrollment before follow-up imaging due to a grade 5 AE unrelated to study treatment and was considered non-evaluable. Best RECIST response for the remaining 4 patients was stable disease (SD) with time on study of 154+, 243, 574, and 741 days. With each patient as his/her own control, rates of tumor growth on entinostat were markedly reduced with rates 17%, 20%, 33%, and 68% of the rates prior to enrollment on study. Toxicities possibly or definitely related to entinostat included grade 2/3 neutrophil count decrease [2/4 (50%)/ 2/4 (50%)], grade 3 hypophosphatemia [1/4, (25%)], grade 1/2 fatigue [1/4 (25%)/ 2/4 (50%)], and other self-limiting grade 1/2 AEs. In the treatment of relapsed or refractory abdominal NETs, entinostat 5 mg weekly led to prolonged SD and reduced the rate of tumor growth by 32% to 83% with an acceptable safety profile (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03211988).

Preoperative-postoperative immunotherapy as treatment of borderline resectable and oligoprogressive stage III B-D and IV melanoma

IntroductionPerioperative therapy has gained significant importance in patients with advanced melanoma. Currently, there is little data on the routine use of preoperative immunotherapy in metastatic melanoma outside clinical trials. This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of preoperative treatment in patients with borderline resectable stage III or IV melanoma as well as in oligoprogressing stage IV cases; the secondary aim is to describe the safety of surgery after immunotherapy. Materials and methodsSince 1/Jan/2016 seventeen patients were treated with curative intent neoadjuvant immunotherapy, surgery, and adjuvant immunotherapy, while nineteen patients were operated due to oligoprogression while treted with immunotherapy. Survival was analyzed using the Kaplan-Meier method and association between variables was tested using the chi-squared test. ResultsR0 resection was achieved in 76.5 % of cases after neoadjuvant immunotherapy. 24 % of patients achieved objective RECIST response and 35 % complete or major pathological response. At the median follow-up time of 51.4 months, 64.7 % of patients were free of PD after perioperative treatment, while 3-year RFS and OS rates were 68 % and 80.9 %, respectively. R0 resection was achieved in 73.7 % of oligo-progressing nodules. The median time to PD on immunotherapy after the first oligoprogression was 10.3 months. Immunotherapy did not result in any unexpected surgical complications. No patient died during preoperative treatment due to immunotherapy toxicity or disease progression. ConclusionsWe confirmed treatment safety and long-term disease control after perioperative immunotherapy. Patients with borderline resectable melanoma should be referred to reference centers using neoadjuvant immunotherapy.

Reappraising the Role of Intraoperative Neck Margin Revision in Post-Neoadjuvant Pancreatoduodenectomy for Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma: A Multi-Institutional Analysis.

To investigate whether revision of pancreatic neck margin based on intraoperative frozen section analysis has oncologic value in post-neoadjuvant pancreatoduodenectomy (PD) for pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC). The role of intraoperative neck margin revision has been controversial, with little information specific to post-neoadjuvant PD. Patients who underwent post-neoadjuvant PD (2013-2019) for conventional PDAC with frozen section analysis of neck margin at three academic institutions were included. Overall survival (OS) and recurrence-free survival (RFS) were compared across three groups: complete resection achieved en-bloc (CR-EB), complete resection achieved non-en-bloc (CR-NEB), and incomplete resection (IR). Among the 671 patients included, 524 (78.1%) underwent CR-EB, 119 (17.7%) CR-NEB and 28 (4.2%) IR. Patients undergoing CR-NEB and IR exhibited larger tumors and lower rates of RECIST response, requiring vascular resections more often. Likewise, CR-NEB and IR were associated with a worse pathological profile than CR-EB. The incidence of postoperative complications and access to adjuvant treatment were comparable among groups. A CR-EB was associated with the longest OS duration (34.3mo). In patients with positive neck margin, obtaining a CR-NEB via re-excision was associated with a comparable OS relative to patients with an IR (26.9 vs. 27.1mo, P=0.901). Similar results were observed for RFS. At multivariable analysis, neck margin status was not independently associated with survival and recurrence. Conversion of an initially positive pancreatic neck margin by additional resection is not associated with oncologic benefits in post-neoadjuvant PD and cannot be routinely recommended.

A Phase I Study of KIN-3248, an Irreversible Small-molecule Pan-FGFR Inhibitor, in Patients with Advanced FGFR2/3-driven Solid Tumors.

Despite efficacy of approved FGFR inhibitors, emergence of polyclonal secondary mutations in the FGFR kinase domain leads to acquired resistance. KIN-3248 is a selective, irreversible, orally bioavailable, small-molecule inhibitor of FGFR1-4 that blocks both primary oncogenic and secondary kinase domain resistance FGFR alterations. A first-in-human, phase I study of KIN-3248 was conducted in patients with advanced solid tumors harboring FGFR2 and/or FGFR3 gene alterations (NCT05242822). The primary objective was determination of MTD/recommended phase II dose (RP2D). Secondary and exploratory objectives included antitumor activity, pharmacokinetics, pharmacodynamics, and molecular response by circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) clearance. Fifty-four patients received doses ranging from 5 to 50 mg orally daily across six cohorts. Intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma (48.1%), gastric (9.3%), and urothelial (7.4%) were the most common tumors. Tumors harbored FGFR2 (68.5%) or FGFR3 (31.5%) alterations-23 (42.6%) received prior FGFR inhibitors. One dose-limiting toxicity (hypersensitivity) occurred in cohort 1 (5 mg). Treatment-related, adverse events included hyperphosphatemia, diarrhea, and stomatitis. The MTD/RP2D was not established. Exposure was dose proportional and concordant with hyperphosphatemia. Five partial responses were observed; 4 in FGFR inhibitor naïve and 1 in FGFR pretreated patients. Pretreatment ctDNA profiling confirmed FGFR2/3 alterations in 63.3% of cases and clearance at cycle 2 associated with radiographic response. The trial was terminated early for commercial considerations; therefore, RP2D was not established. Preliminary clinical data suggest that KIN-3248 is a safe, oral FGFR1-4 inhibitor with favorable pharmacokinetic parameters, though further dose escalation was required to nominate the MTD/RP2D. KIN-3248 was a rationally designed, next generation selective FGFR inhibitor, that was effective in interfering with both FGFR wild-type and mutant signaling. Clinical data indicate that KIN-3248 is safe with a signal of antitumor activity. Translational science support the mechanism of action in that serum phosphate was proportional with exposure, paired biopsies suggested phospho-ERK inhibition (a downstream target of FGFR2/3), and ctDNA clearance may act as a RECIST response surrogate.

Abstract CT101: Final results of the first-in-human study of the porcupine (PORCN) inhibitor zamaporvint (RXC004) in patients with advanced solid tumors

Abstract Background Dysregulated Wnt signalling drives several cancers through effects on proliferation, fibrosis and immune evasion. RXC004 is a novel oral small molecule inhibitor of protein-serine O-palmitoyltransferase (PORCN), which is required for the post-translational modification and activation of Wnt ligands. RXC004 has potential for efficacy in upstream Wnt pathway activated tumours: ~5% pancreatic cancer and ~8% microsatellite stable colorectal (CRC) cancer with RNF43 mutations or RSPO fusions, and tumors with high Wnt ligand expression. Methods In this Phase I study of RXC004 (NCT03447470), Module 1 investigated continuous monotherapy dosing, Module 2 investigated combination with nivolumab 480mg s.c. Q4W and Module 3 investigated intermittent monotherapy dosing (2 weeks on 1 week off). Patients received denosumab 120 mg s.c Q4W to prevent loss of bone mineral density (BMD), a known effect of Wnt inhibition. The primary objectives were safety and tolerability. Secondary objectives were PK and RECIST response. PD markers included on-treatment changes in: Wnt pathway and fibrosis biomarkers in paired skin biopsies; circulating immune subsets by flow cytometry; cytokine changes by Luminex, and changes in circulating-tumor DNA (ctDNA) levels by ddPCR. Results In Module 1, 25 patients (pts) with unselected advanced solid tumors (AST) received RXC004 between 0.5mg and 10mg QD. The RP2D was 2mg QD; at this dose the most common AEs were fatigue, diarrhoea, dysgeusia and decreased appetite; no grade 4/5 AEs or bone fragility events were reported whilst 1 pt had a RXC004-related grade 3 AE, 3 pts (50%) had a dose interruption and 1 had a dose reduction. The median T1/2 of RXC004 was 14.5h. 5 pts with upstream Wnt pathway activated tumors had stable disease (SD), in 1 case for 26 weeks with sustained reduction in ctDNA and no BMD loss. In Module 2, 14 patients with unselected AST received RXC004 at 1mg QD or 1.5mg QD with nivolumab. The AE profile was similar to Module 1. The RP2D was 1.5mg QD; at this dose 3 pts had a RXC004-related grade 3 AE, 6 pts (75%) had a dose interruption and 3 had a dose reduction, and 4 pts had SD. PK was similar to Module 1. In Module 3, 7 patients with upstream Wnt-activated AST received RXC004 2mg QD, 2 weeks on, 1 week off. The AE profile was similar to Modules 1 and 2. There were no RXC004-related Grade 3 AEs, 2 pts (29%) had a dose interruption and there were no dose reductions. PK and PD analyses confirmed time off target. 2 pts had SD; 1 pt with RSPO fusion small intestinal adenocarcinoma remained on treatment for 36 weeks, with sustained reduction in ctDNA and no BMD loss. Conclusions In patients with AST, RXC004 was safe and tolerated at doses up to 2mg QD as monotherapy and 1.5mg QD in combination with nivolumab, demonstrating differential disease control in upstream Wnt pathway activated tumours. Denosumab prevented loss of BMD. Intermittent RXC004 dosing was well tolerated with no detrimental impact on efficacy. Citation Format: Natalie Cook, Sarah Blagden, Juanita Lopez, Debashis Sarker, Alastair Greystoke, Noor MD Haris, Farasat Kazmi, Kaiser Anam, Ana Ortego Franco, Rille Pihlak, Louise Goodwin, David Wilson, Caroline Phillips, Jane Robertson, Helen Timmis, Craig Tilston, Simon A. Woodcock, Ruth Plummer. Final results of the first-in-human study of the porcupine (PORCN) inhibitor zamaporvint (RXC004) in patients with advanced solid tumors [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2024; Part 2 (Late-Breaking, Clinical Trial, and Invited Abstracts); 2024 Apr 5-10; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2024;84(7_Suppl):Abstract nr CT101.