pembrolizumab

Pembrolizumab Provides Long-Term Benefit in Melanoma, Regardless of BRAF+ Status or Prior Targeted TherapyBookmark

Article from OncLive curated by Editor in Chief George Lundberg, MD, who notes: 

A new study shows that the drug pembrolizomab significantly prolongs survival in patients with metastatic melanoma, regardless of whether their tumors have mutations in the BRAF gene or if they’ve had prior treatment with targeted therapy.

Go to full article published by OncLive.

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FDA Approves Merck’s Keytruda, Foundation Medicine CDx for TMB-High Solid TumorsBookmark

Article from GenomeWeb curated by Editor in Chief George Lundberg, MD, who notes: 

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved the drug pembrolizumab (brand name Keytruda) for solid tumors based solely on whether they have a high tumor mutational burden—a high number of changes in the DNA of the cancer cells.

Go to full article published by GenomeWeb.

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Pembrolizumab Approved for Some Patients with Advanced Esophageal CancerBookmark

Article from the National Cancer Institute curated by Editor in Chief George Lundberg, MD, who notes: 

In 2019, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved pembrolizumab for certain advanced esophageal cancers, depending on testing results. The National Cancer Institute explains here.

Go to full article published by the National Cancer Institute.

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New Standard of Care for Metastatic Renal Cell CarcinomaBookmark

Article from Medscape curated by Editor in Chief George Lundberg, MD, who notes: 

This piece describes huge improvements in the standard of care and outcomes from combo therapy in metastatic renal cell carcinoma.

Go to full article published by Medscape.

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Pembrolizumab Plus Lenvatinib Approved for Endometrial CancerBookmark

Article from Cancer Network curated by Editor in Chief George Lundberg, MD, who notes: 

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a new combination therapy for certain advanced endometrial cancers.

Go to full article published by Cancer Network.

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FDA Expands Pembrolizumab Indication for First-Line Treatment of NSCLC (Tps ≥1%)Bookmark

Excerpt:

“On April 11, 2019, the Food and Drug Administration approved pembrolizumab (KEYTRUDA, Merck Inc.) for the first-line treatment of patients with stage III non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who are not candidates for surgical resection or definitive chemoradiation or metastatic NSCLC. Patients’ tumors must have no EGFR or ALK genomic aberrations and express PD-L1 (Tumor Proportion Score [TPS] ≥1%) determined by an FDA-approved test.

“Pembrolizumab was previously approved as a single agent for the first-line treatment of patients with metastatic NSCLC whose tumors express PD-L1 TPS ≥50%.”

Go to full article published by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on April 11, 2019.

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Pembrolizumab Shows Durable Benefit as Third-Line Treatment of Advanced Small Cell Lung CancerBookmark

Excerpt:

“Pembrolizumab demonstrated antitumor activity and induced durable responses in patients with advanced small cell lung cancer who had received two or more previous lines of therapy, according to pooled data from two KEYNOTE trials presented at American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting.”

Go to full article published by Healio on April 3, 2019

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A Single Dose of a PD-1 Inhibitor Before Surgery May Predict Outcomes in Patients With MelanomaBookmark

Excerpt:

“A single dose of a programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1) inhibitor before resection for melanoma may predict clinical outcomes for patients. Researchers from the Abramson Cancer Center at the University of Pennsylvania—who documented this finding in the largest cohort of patients to be treated with anti–PD-1 drugs before surgery—also showed that immune responses brought on by this therapy can peak as early as 7 days after treatment—much earlier than previous studies have shown. These findings were published by Huang et al in Nature Medicine.”

Go to full article published by The ASCO Post on March 7, 2019.

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Pembrolizumab Regimen Receives FDA Approval for Frontline Treatment of Squamous NSCLCBookmark

Excerpt:

“Based on findings from the phase III KEYNOTE-407 trial, pembrolizumab (Keytruda) has been approved by the FDA for use in combination with carboplatin and either paclitaxel or nab-paclitaxel (Abraxane) for the frontline treatment of patients with metastatic squamous non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

“Results from the trial showed combining pembrolizumab with chemotherapy reduced the risk of death by 36% compared with chemotherapy alone in patients with metastatic squamous NSCLC. The median overall survival (OS) was 15.9 months (95% CI, 13.2 – not evaluable) with pembrolizumab versus 11.3 months (95% CI, 9.5-14.8) with chemotherapy alone (HR, 0.64; 95% CI, 0.49-0.85; P = .0017). The OS benefit was observed regardless of PD-L1 expression level, choice of taxane, age, sex, and ECOG performance status.”

Go to full article published by Targeted Oncology on Oct 30, 2018.

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