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Joyce F. Liu, MD, MPH
Joyce F. Liu, MD, MPH
Posted: Friday, February 7, 2025
BMC Cancer has published the results of a study examining the real-world efficacy of the antibody-drug conjugate fam-trastuzumab deruxtecan-nxki (T-DXd) in treating HER2-expressing gynecologic malignancies. Angeliki Andrikopoulou, MD, PhD, of Alexandra Hospital, Athens, Greece, and colleagues reported that clinical activity with this agent was observed among a cohort of heavily pretreated patients with these cancers. The researchers stressed the need for further study—especially phase III trials—to investigate the use of T-DXd in this patient population.
“Recently, [T-DXd] has shown substantial efficacy in HER2-overexpressing carcinomas, most prominently in ovarian, endometrial, and cervical patients,” the investigators noted. “To our knowledge, this is the first study reporting real-world data on this novel treatment approach in gynecologic cancer except for one phase II trial and a small cohort of uterine carcinosarcomas.”
A total of 10 patients with gynecologic malignancies with HER2 expressions of 2+ or 3+ were included in the retrospective study. Participants were treated at Alexandra General Hospital, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, where they received 5.4 mg/kg of T-DXd intravenously every 3 weeks until disease progression or unacceptable toxicity. The median age of participants was 65.4 years.
Among the participants, five had HER2 expression of 3+, and five had HER2 expression of 2+. The median number of previous lines of therapy was four (range = 2–6); two patients with uterine serous carcinoma previously received treatment with trastuzumab, and four patients previously received immunotherapy.
The median progression-free survival of the entire cohort was 5.4 months (95% confidence interval = 0.8–9.8 months). A partial response was observed in five patients (including two who were pretreated with trastuzumab); one patient had stable disease at 12 weeks, and four had disease progression at initial assessment. All patients (except one) who derived clinical benefit had HER2 expression of 3+.
Disclosure: Dr. Andrikopoulou reported no conflicts of interest. For full disclosures of the other study authors, visit bmccancer.biomedcentral.com.
