Dr. Shroff on Unmet Needs in Advanced Biliary Tract Cancer

Rachna T. Shroff, MD, MS, associate dean, Clinical and Translational Research, associate professor, Medicine in the Clinical Scholar Track, chief, Section of GI Medical Oncology, director, University of Arizona (UA) Cancer Center, director, UA Cancer Center Clinical Trials Office, UA Health Sciences, discusses unmet needs in advanced biliary tract cancer.

With limited drug options in advanced biliary tract cancer, there remains an unmet need for drug development in this patient population. Another unmet need is regarding the utilization of immunotherapy, which has not proven to be effective in all-comers with biliary tract cancers, Shroff adds. Overall, understanding how to capitalize on use immunotherapy in this patient population will be an important step, Shroff says.

Although some patients have targetable genomic alterations, the majority of patients with biliary tract cancer do not, Shroff says. Therefore, improvements are needed in the clinical trials evaluating all-comers to investigate additional chemotherapy options or to build on the currently utilized chemotherapy backbones, Shroff continues. Multiple trials are currently ongoing to evaluate the addition of immunotherapy to gemcitabine and cisplatin, Shroff says. The field is awaiting the results of these studies as the data may inform how to better treat patients with biliary tract cancer irrespective of biomarker status, Shroff concludes.