Dr. O'Reilly on the Utility of PARP Inhibitors in Pancreatic Cancer

Eileen O'Reilly, MD, Winthrop Rockefeller Endowed Chair in Medical Oncology, co-director, Medical Initiatives, David M. Rubenstein Center for Pancreatic Cancer Research, section head, Hepatopancreaticobilary and Neuroendocrine Cancers, and medical oncologist, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, discusses the utility of PARP inhibitors in pancreatic cancer.

In December 2019, the FDA approved olaparib (Lynparza) for frontline maintenance treatment of adult patients with germline BRCA-mutated metastatic pancreatic adenocarcinoma whose disease has not progressed on at least 16 weeks of a first-line platinum-based chemotherapy regimen.

This approval is important for this subset of patients with BRCA-mutant pancreatic cancer, says O’Reilly. Further research may show that combination therapy with PARP inhibitors is beneficial for patients with other DNA damage repair pathway gene mutations or somatic mutations.

In the clinic, it is important to consider using PARP inhibitors before the patient’s disease progresses, says O’Reilly. Patients who progress on platinum-based therapy have a greater chance of developing resistance to PARP inhibitors.

As such, patients with stable disease who are responding to frontline chemotherapy should be considered for a PARP inhibitor to de-intensify their treatment, provide more flexibility in their schedule, and provide potential disease control, concludes O’Reilly.