Niraparib and Pembrolizumab Combination Therapy for Recurrent Ovarian Cancer
Posted: Wednesday, July 11, 2018
The PARP inhibitor niraparib and the immune checkpoint inhibitor pembrolizumab in combination may prove to be an effective therapy against recurrent ovarian cancer, according to the phase I/II TOPACIO/KEYNOTE-162 clinical trial. The research was presented at the 2018 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting (Abstract 106) by Panagiotis A. Konstantinopoulos, MD, PhD, of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and colleagues.
“PARP inhibitors may prime the immune system to facilitate response to immune checkpoint blockade and provide the preclinical rationale for combinations of PARP inhibitors with immune checkpoint inhibitors,” stated Dr. Konstantinopoulos, and coauthor Ursula A. Matulonis, MD, also of Dana-Farber, in the ASCO Daily News.
Included in the study were 62 patients with recurrent ovarian cancer, with a median age of 60 years. Patients must have exhibited a response to first-line platinum therapy of at least 6 months, be ineligible for further platinum therapy, and have had no more than five prior treatment lines. Primary platinum-refractory disease was excluded, but secondary platinum-refractory disease was not.
The objective response rate among the 60 evaluable patients was 25%, and the disease control rate was 68%. In the 11 patients with tumor BRCA-mutant disease, the outcomes were better, with an objective response rate of 45% and a disease control rate of 73%. The investigators found that 11 of 38 patients (29%) with platinum-resistant disease, 2 of 11 patients (18%) with platinum-refractory disease, and 1 of 10 patients (10%) with platinum-sensitive disease responded to the combination therapy. The most common adverse events of grade 3 or higher were anemia (19%) and thrombocytopenia (9%). A total of 20 patients remain on treatment.
