The Oncology Journal Club Episode 3: ASCO 2020 Review 1

The Oncology Podcast, brought to you by www.oncologynews.com.au, is proud to present the next episode in our new series – The Oncology Journal Club.

This week we have our first post ASCO 2020 review episode, hosted by the brilliant Professor Eva Segelov from Monash University. She is joined by Dr Craig Underhill from Albury-Wodonga who interviews one of the presenters from ASCO 2020 – Professor Natasha Leighl from the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre in Toronto.

Eva gives us expert analysis of KEYNOTE 355 and tells us why you need to watch out for monoclonal payloads.  Also this week, Eva and Professor Hans Prenen from Belgium, present some of their ‘Winners and Losers from ASCO 2020’.

With the usual knock-about banter between our awesome presenters you are in for a great episode of The Oncology Journal Club. As ever, the links to all the papers discussed today are available below.

About The Oncology Journal Club

We have taken an old concept and updated it with a new format. In each episode a team of expert contributors will review topical journal papers and studies presented at key meetings to help keep you informed of the latest developments on the go.

With The Oncology Podcast – and The Oncology Journal Club in particular – we are aiming to deliver oncology news differently,” Rachael Babin, Editor-in-Chief, Oncology News.

We hope you enjoy listening and find this a valuable resource. Please let us know what you think!

This Week’s Team:

Professor Eva Segelov

Professor Eva Segelov is a Medical Oncologist and is Director of Oncology at Monash University and Monash Health, Melbourne, Victoria, previously Senior Medical Oncologist at St Vincent’s Hospital, St Vincent’s Private Hospital and St Vincent’s Clinic and Associate Professor of Medicine, University of New South Wales.

Eva has an interest in academic clinical trials in GI and breast cancer and has been a member of the AGITG since 2003. She has clinical trials expertise, links with national and international trials groups, and extensive experience with adult medical education.

Professor Hans Prenen

Professor Hans Prenen is a medical oncologist and head of the phase 1 – early clinical trials unit at the Antwerp University Hospital in Belgium. He is a member of several scientific organisations, published many scientific oncology papers in prestigious journals and is regularly invited for lectures at national and international meetings.  His interests are clinical trials and translational research with a focus on digestive oncology.

 

Dr Craig Underhill

Dr Craig Underhill completed his Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery in 1987 at Melbourne University. He completed medical oncology training in Melbourne and worked as the Senior Clinical Research Registrar at Guy’s Hospital, London.

In 1998 arrived in Albury-Wodonga and established a medical oncology practice and clinical trials unit which has developed expertise and infrastructure to ensure the initiation of high quality trials. The research Unit lead by Dr Underhill has twice been awarded NSW Premier’s Award for Innovation in Cancer Clinical Trials, the inaugural award in 2009 and then again in 2012.

Dr Underhill chaired a working party that was instrumental in securing $65 million in federal funding for The Albury Wodonga Regional Cancer Centre which opened in September 2016.

Dr Underhill is the VCCC Regional Oncology Lead and advocates for the increased access to clinical trials for regional Victorians and leads the VCCC teletrials program.

Professor Natasha Leighl

Dr Natasha Leighl leads the Thoracic Medical Oncology Group at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, and is Professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of Toronto.  She holds the OSI Pharmaceuticals Foundation Chair in Cancer New Drug Development. She has over 250 peer-reviewed publications, has held (as principal or co-investigator) over $600 million in peer-reviewed grant funding, and has mentored many oncology trainees that have gone on to leadership roles in oncology around the world. Recently, she was awarded the American Society of Clinical Oncology Excellence in Teaching Award (2019).

After receiving her MD from the University of Toronto, Canada, Dr. Leighl completed residencies in internal medicine at the University of Calgary and in medical oncology at the University of Toronto. She subsequently completed a Fellowship in Thoracic Oncology with Dr. Frances Shepherd at the Princess Margaret Hospital in Canada, a Fellowship in Clinical Oncology with Prof. Martin Tattersall at the University of Sydney in Australia, and received her Masters in Medical Science (MMSc) in Clinical Epidemiology at the University of Newcastle, Australia.

Dr Leighl’s main interest is in developing new treatments in lung cancer. She is involved in clinical studies of novel agents for the treatment of thoracic cancers, has led several international and cooperative group studies in lung cancer and is a member of the Lung Disease Site Group Executive of the Canadian Cancer Clinical Trials Group.

Rachael Babin

Rachael Babin is Editor-in-Chief of The Oncology Newsletter and Publisher of www.oncologynews.com.au. For regular oncology updates for healthcare professionals, please subscribe to The Oncology Newsletter.

With thanks to Eva Segelov, Craig Underhill, Hans Prenen, Natasha Leighl and Graham Knowles.

 

 

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This Week’s Papers:

Main Papers:

1. Cortes, Javier, et al. KEYNOTE-355: Randomized, double-blind, phase III study of pembrolizumab + chemotherapy versus placebo + chemotherapy for previously untreated locally recurrent inoperable or metastatic triple-negative breast cancer. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 1000). Access online here.
2. Ramalingam, Suresh S., et al. Nivolumab + ipilimumab versus platinum-doublet chemotherapy as first-line treatment for advanced non-small cell lung cancer: Three-year update from CheckMate 227 Part 1. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 9500). Access online here.
3. Reck, Martin, et al. Nivolumab (NIVO) + ipilimumab (IPI) + 2 cycles of platinum-doublet chemotherapy (chemo) vs 4 cycles chemo as first-line (1L) treatment (tx) for stage IV/recurrent non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC): CheckMate 9LA. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 9501). Access online here.
4. Leighl, Natasha, et al. CCTG BR.34: A randomized trial of durvalumab and tremelimumab +/- platinum-based chemotherapy in patients with metastatic (Stage IV) squamous or nonsquamous non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 9502). Access online here.
5. Forde, Patrick M., et al. PrE0505: Phase II multicenter study of anti-PD-L1, durvalumab, in combination with cisplatin and pemetrexed for the first-line treatment of unresectable malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM)—A PrECOG LLC study. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 9003). Access online here.
6. Paz, Luis G., et al. Durvalumab ± tremelimumab + platinum-etoposide in first-line extensive-stage SCLC (ES-SCLC): Updated Results from the phase III CASPIAN study. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 9002). Access online here.
7. Rudin, Charles M., et al. KEYNOTE-604: Pembrolizumab (pembro) or placebo plus etoposide and platinum (EP) as first-line therapy for extensive-stage (ES) small-cell lung cancer (SCLC). J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 9001). Access online here.
8. Herbst, Roy S., et al. Osimertinib as adjuvant therapy in patients (pts) with stage IB–IIIA EGFR mutation positive (EGFRm) NSCLC after complete tumor resection: ADAURA. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr LBA5). Access online here.
9. Smit, Egbert F., et al. Trastuzumab deruxtecan (T-DXd; DS-8201) in patients with HER2-mutated metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC): Interim results of DESTINY-Lung01. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 9504). Access online here.

ASCO 2020 Winners and Losers:

Eva’s Winners:

1. Stadler, Zsofia Kinga, et al. Targeted therapy based on germline analysis of tumor-normal sequencing (MSK-IMPACT) in a pan-cancer population. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 1500). Access online here.
2. Goto, Koichi, et al. Selpercatinib (LOXO-292) in patients with RET-fusion+ non-small cell lung cancer. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 3584). Access online here.
3. Subbiah, Vivek, et al. Clinical activity of the RET inhibitor pralsetinib (BLU-667) in patients with RET fusion+ solid tumors. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 109). Access online here.
4. Modi, Shanu, et al. Trastuzumab Deruxtecan in Previously Treated HER2-Positive Breast Cancer. February 13, 2020. N Engl J Med 2020; 382:610-621. Access online here.
5. Fuchs, Charles S., et al. A phase II trial of [fam-] trastuzumab deruxtecan (T-DXd, DS-8201a) in subjects with HER2-positive, unresectable, or metastatic gastric or gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) adenocarcinoma. J Clin Oncol 38, 2020 (suppl 4; abstr TPS460). Access online here.
6. Siena, Salvatore, et al. A phase II, multicenter, open-label study of trastuzumab deruxtecan (T-DXd; DS-8201) in patients (pts) with HER2-expressing metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC): DESTINY-CRC01. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 4000). Access online here.
7. Shitara, Kohei, et al. Trastuzumab deruxtecan (T-DXd; DS-8201) in patients with HER2-positive advanced gastric or gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) adenocarcinoma: A randomized, phase II, multicenter, open-label study (DESTINY-Gastric01). J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 4513). Access online here.
8. Lin, Nancy U., et al. Tucatinib versus placebo added to trastuzumab and capecitabine for patients with previously treated HER2+ metastatic breast cancer with brain metastases (HER2CLIMB). J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 1005). Access online here.
9. Krook, Melanie A., et al. Pan-cancer analysis of FGFR1-3 genomic alterations to reveal a complex molecular landscape. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 3620). Access online here.Paik, Paul K., et al. Tepotinib in patients (pts) with NSCLC with MET exon 14 (METex14) skipping: Health-related quality of life (HRQoL). J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 9575). Access online here.
10. Le, Xiuning, et al. Primary efficacy and biomarker analyses from the VISION study of tepotinib in patients (pts) with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with METex14 skipping. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 9556). Access online here.
11. Rugo, Hope S., et al. Alpelisib (ALP) + fulvestrant (FUL) in patients (pts) with PIK3CA-mutated (mut) hormone receptor-positive (HR+), human epidermal growth factor receptor 2-negative (HER2–) advanced breast cancer (ABC) previously treated with cyclin-dependent kinase 4/6 inhibitor (CDKi) + aromatase inhibitor (AI): BYLieve study results. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 1006). Access online here.

Hans’ Losers:

1. Ahsan Khan, Seema, et al. A randomized phase III trial of systemic therapy plus early local therapy versus systemic therapy alone in women with de novo stage IV breast cancer: A trial of the ECOG-ACRIN Research Group (E2108). J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr LBA2). Access online here.
2. Harbeck, Nadia, et al. Primary analysis of KAITLIN: A phase III study of trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1) + pertuzumab versus trastuzumab + pertuzumab + taxane, after anthracyclines as adjuvant therapy for high-risk HER2-positive early breast cancer (EBC). J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 500). Access online here.
3. Cobleigh, Melody A., et al. Primary results of NRG Oncology / NSABP B-43: Phase III trial comparing concurrent trastuzumab (T) and radiation therapy (RT) with RT alone for women with HER2-positive ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) after lumpectomy. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 508). Access online here.
4. Meyerhardt, Jeffrey A., et al. Celecoxib in addition to standard adjuvant therapy with 5-fluorouracil, leucovorin, oxaliplatin (FOLFOX) in stage III colon cancer: Results from CALGB/SWOG 80702. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 4003). Access online here.

5. Safran, Howard, et al. Trastuzumab with trimodality treatment for esophageal adenocarcinoma with HER2 overexpression: NRG Oncology/RTOG 1010. J Clin Oncol 38: 2020 (suppl; abstr 4500). Access online here.

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