ELCC 2018: Updated Survival Results With Atezolizumab in the POPLAR Trial
Posted: Monday, April 16, 2018
Atezolizumab provides a “landmark overall survival benefit” for patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) versus treatment with docetaxel, according to the 3-year survival data from the phase II POPLAR trial, presented at the European Lung Cancer Congress (ELCC) 2018 in Geneva, Switzerland (Abstract 136PD_PR). The updated results of the study, led by Julien Mazières, MD, PhD, of Toulouse University Hospital in France, found the survival benefit was consistently observed regardless of histology and PD-L1 expression.
“The fact that all subgroups of patients benefited to a similar degree is good in the sense that atezolizumab can be tried in all advanced NSCLC patients,” noted Dr. Mazières in an ELCC press release. “On the other hand, it means we cannot predict which patients are most likely to live for 3 years. We need to find biomarkers to help us identify the long-term survivors with the drug.”
The multicenter trial randomized 287 previously treated patients with advanced NSCLC to receive atezolizumab, an anti–PD-L1 monoclonal antibody, or docetaxel. At 2 years, 32.2% of the atezolizumab treatment group were alive compared with 16.6% of the docetaxel group; at 3 years, overall survival was 18.7% versus 10.0%, respectively.
The median duration of response was three times longer with atezolizumab (22.3 months) compared with docetaxel (7.2 months), and atezolizumab had a more favorable safety profile with fewer adverse events than docetaxel.
