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Leo I. Gordon, MD, FACP
Leo I. Gordon, MD, FACP
Posted: Thursday, March 2, 2023
The use of the anti-CD19 chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy tisagenlecleucel in the treatment of relapsed or refractory follicular lymphoma may improve patient outcomes, according to the results of the ongoing, global, multicenter, phase II ELARA trial, published in Blood Advances. Treatment with tisagenlecleucel demonstrated superior efficacy over the standard of care, making it a suitable alternative for patients, according to Brian K. Link, MD, of the University of Iowa, Iowa City, and colleagues.
A total of 98 patients with relapsed or refractory follicular lymphoma were recruited for the study. All patients were treated with tisagenlecleucel. These patients were compared with 187 patients recruited from the ReCORD-FL retrospective study who had received a minimum of two previous drug therapies.
The study findings revealed an increased complete response rate for patients treated with tisagenlecleucel (69%) compared with those treated with the standard of care (37.3%). A similar trend was observed for overall response rate (85.6% with tisagenlecleucel vs. 63.6% with the standard of care). In addition, patients treated with tisagenlecleucel had a 70.5% progression-free rate at 12 months, whereas those who received the standard of care had a 51.9% progression-free rate (hazard ratio [HR] = 0.60). Moreover, tisagenlecleucel therapy increased 12-month overall survival (96.6% vs. 71.7%, HR = 0.2). Furthermore, an 80% reduction in the risk for death was observed in patients treated with tisagenlecleucel.
“Taken together, the findings presented here provide a key benchmark and suggest that [tisagenlecleucel] may be a valuable treatment option for consideration in patients with multiply relapsed or refractory follicular lymphoma,” the study authors stated.
Disclosure: For full disclosures of the study authors, visit ashpublications.org.
