The following article features coverage from the IASLC 18th World Conference on Lung Cancer (WCLC) in Yokohama, Japan. Click here to read more of Cancer Therapy Advisor‘s conference coverage.

An updated analysis of the KEYNOTE-024 (ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT02142738) study showed that pembrolizumab monotherapy maintained superiority compared with platinum-based chemotherapy and nearly doubled overall survival (OS) among patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), according to a presentation at the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (IASLC) 18th Annual World Conference on Lung Cancer (WCLC) in Yokohama, Japan.1

For the phase 3 KEYNOTE-024 study, researchers randomly assigned 305 patients with advanced NSCLC of any histological type to 35 cycles of pembrolizumab or 4 to 6 cycles of investigator’s choice chemotherapy. Eligible patients did not have EGFR mutations or ALK translocations and had a PD-L1 tumor proportion score of 50% or greater.


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The median follow-up period for the current analysis was 25.2 months. Patients in the pembrolizumab arm had a median OS of 30.0 months (95% CI, 18.3-not reached) compared with 14.2 months (95% CI, 9.8-19.0) among patients in the chemotherapy arm. A Kaplan-Meier estimate of OS at 12 months was 70.3% (95% CI, 62.3%-76.9%) and 54.8% (95% CI, 46.4%-62.4%) for the pembrolizumab arm and chemotherapy arm, respectively.

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At time of follow-up, 47.4% and 63.6% of patients in the pembrolizumab arm and chemotherapy arm had died, respectively. Eighty-two patients enrolled in the chemotherapy arm crossed over once meeting eligibility criteria for the pembrolizumab arm.

Patients in the pembrolizumab arm had lower rates of grade 3 to 5 adverse events (AEs) compared with those in the chemotherapy arm (31.2% vs 53.3%, respectively), as well as a lower rate of overall AEs (76.6% vs 90.0%, respectively).

Read more of Cancer Therapy Advisor‘s coverage of the IASLC 18th World Conference on Lung Cancer (WCLC) by visiting the conference page.

Reference

  1. Brahmer JR, Rodriguez-Abreu D, Robinson A, et al. Updated analysis of KEYNOTE-024: pembrolizumab vs platinum-based chemotherapy for advanced NSCLC with PD-L1 TPS>50%. Presented at: International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer 18th World Conference on Lung Cancer; Yokohama, Japan: October 15-18, 2017. Abstract OA 17.06.