Dr. Topalian on the PD-1 Targeted Therapy BMS-936558

Suzanne Topalian, MD, Professor of Surgery and Oncology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, discusses early-stage results of the targeted immune agent BMS-936558, a co-inhibitor of the programmed death-1 (PD-1) receptor that is expressed by activated T cells.

The phase I trial sought to discover if BMS-936558 was clinically active in pretreated patients with multiple tumor types, who, in some cases, had previously received three or more prior therapies.

Topalian notes that the most remarkable findings from the trial included patients with advanced melanoma, renal cell carcinoma (RCC), and non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Objective responses were 28% for patients with melanoma, 27% with RCC, and 18% for NSCLC.

The BMS-936558 trial is still ongoing and the results presented at the 2012 ASCO Annual Meeting were gathered at an interim analysis. However, according to Topalian, the preliminary data suggests that partial and complete tumor regression may last for longer than one year and disease stabilization may persist for more than six months, in some patients.

The trial plans to conduct an additional follow up at a later date, but early results have shown promising responses to BMS-936558 for patients with melanoma, RCC, and NSCLC.

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