Promising Results for New Antibody Drug in Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Patients

 

ECC 2013 Press Release: Promising Results for New Antibody Drug in Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer Patients: Smokers Respond Well | ESMO.

Today is the final day of the European Cancer Conference in Amsterdam. The organisers have released a stream of press releases to coincide with the conference, which you can browse here:

http://www.esmo.org/Conferences/European-Cancer-Congress-2013/News

However I just wanted to pick out one, which describes recent results with one of a new group of antibody treatments that block the interaction between PD-L1 and PD-1.

As they explain in the press release:

“The programmed death 1 protein PD-1 and its signalling molecule (or ligand) PD-L1 prevent the body’s immune system from attacking and killing cancer cells and this allows the cancer to spread.

However, the anti-PD-L1 monoclonal antibody, MPDL3280A, works by blocking the interaction between PD-L1 and the immune system, thereby boosting a patient’s anti-cancer immune response.

The same news is covered on Medscape:

New Immunotherapy Could Be ‘Game Changer’ in NSCLC.

One of the most exciting aspects of the news is the discovery that benefits smokers and ex-smokers – people who are highly unlikely to have cancers that will respond to EGF-R inhibitors (Iressa & Tarceva) or ALK inhibitors (Zalkori).