Dr. Sonpavde on Immunotherapy Plus Chemotherapy in Bladder Cancer

Guru Sonpavde, MD, director of Bladder Cancer at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, discusses immunotherapy plus chemotherapy in bladder cancer.

There are many ongoing trials investigating checkpoint inhibitors in the first-line setting of advanced bladder cancer. In the cisplatin-ineligible space, atezolizumab (Tecentriq) and pembrolizumab (Keytruda) are approved as single agents.

One approach is combining these checkpoint inhibitors with platinum-based chemotherapy in the first-line setting for patients who are both cisplatin-eligible and cisplatin-ineligible. Another approach is combining PD-1/PD-L1 inhibitors with CTLA-4 inhibitors. Ongoing trials are investigating these combinations.