ASCO 2019: Long-Term Survival With Pembrolizumab for Advanced NSCLC
Posted: Thursday, June 6, 2019
The overall survival rates for treatment-naive and previously treated patients with advanced non–small-cell lung carcinoma (NSCLC) who received pembrolizumab were better than historical rates for persons treated before the introduction of anti–PD-1 therapy, according to 5-year data from the KEYNOTE-001 trial. The findings, presented at the 2019 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting in Chicago (Abstract LBA9015), also found similar overall survival rates in both treatment populations with PD-L1 Tumor Proportion Scores ≥ 50%, concluded Edward B. Garon, MD, of the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles, and colleagues.
During a press briefing for journalists before the meeting, Richard L. Schilsky, MD, FACP, FSCT, FASCO, Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer of ASCO, noted the “transformative impact of these agents in lung cancer and other cancers.”
The authors enrolled 550 patients who had been diagnosed with locally advanced or metastatic NSCLC. Patients provided a contemporaneous tumor sample for PD-L1 evaluation. Patients received 2 mg/kg of pembrolizumab once every 3 weeks or 10 mg/kg once every 2 or 3 weeks. Of the patient population, 449 were previously treated and 101 were not.
After a median follow-up of 60.6 months, 450 patients (82%) had died. Overall survival for treatment-naive patients was 23.2%, and it was 15.5% for the previously treated cohort, both significantly higher than the 5% overall survival historical rate for patients treated prior to the development of anti–PD-1 therapy. In addition, among treatment-naive patients, the overall response rate was 42%, and it was 23% for previously treated patients. The median duration of response was 16.8 months and 38.9 months for treatment-naive and previously treated patients, respectively.
At the 5-year follow-up, immune-mediated adverse events occurred in 17% of all patients. This rate was similar to the rates of adverse events occurrence after 3 years.
Disclosure: The study authors’ disclosure information may be found at coi.asco.org.
