Experts Highlight Noteworthy Research From the 2024 ESMO Congress

Meredith McKean, MD

In case you missed the variety of sessions at the 2024 ESMO Congress or want to know more about ongoing research in oncology, experts have provided OncLive^® with their exclusive insights on notable clinical trials and up-and-coming therapies discussed during the meeting. Read on to learn more.

The BNT211-01 Trial

“There was an interesting study from BioNTech, [the phase 1 BNT211-01 trial (NCT04503278)], investigating a combination of a Claudin 6 [CLDN6]–targeting CAR T-cell therapy with an mRNA personalized vaccine [in patients with relapsed/refractory CLDN6-positive solid tumors],” Meredith McKean, MD, the director of Melanoma and Skin Cancer Research for Sarah Cannon Research Institute in Nashville, said in an interview with OncLive.

“That’s one of the first studies evaluating 2 novel technologies together and seeing how well tolerated [the combination] was, [as well as what the] responses were when combining these novel therapeutics.”

The TRIM Study

Gustav Ullenhag, MD, a professor in the Department of Immunology, Genetics and Pathology at Uppsala University in Sweden, expanded on 2 studies of interest in cutaneous malignant melanoma in another interview.

“[The TRIM study (NCT03116412)] is a large study. We have now included approximately 1200 patients. Patients [with stage IIB to IIC or stage III cutaneous malignant melanoma] have been randomly assigned to [undergo] radiological follow-up with [CT or FDG-PET/CT] scans or no scans. The patients have [previously undergone surgery] for high-risk, cutaneous malignant melanoma,” he detailed, adding that, “The question is: Do scans add benefit in this patient group? We conducted an interim analysis indicating that [scans do not] seem to add at least survival benefit, which is what we would like to achieve in the end for these patients. This is an important study, but we don’t have the final results yet."

“Another study is headed by the Karolinska Institutet – Cancer Center Karolinska in Sweden [and is investigating] follow-up of patients with malignant melanoma who have received adjuvant systemic treatment vs those who have not received this treatment,” Ullenhag continued. “It’s a cohort study [looking at outcomes] before giving adjuvant treatment vs after. We can’t, so far, see any survival benefit [with adjuvant treatment vs no adjuvant treatment]. This is a retrospective study. We would like to see a survival gain in the [adjuvant] cohort in the end. The question is: What are the benefits with adjuvant treatment?

Additionally, we have to wait for the overall survival results of the [phase 3] KEYNOTE-054 study [(NCT02362594) of adjuvant pembrolizumab (Keytruda) vs placebo in patients with resected stage III melanoma], but they may not be seen until 2026.

The EA3163 Study

“[The phase 2] EA3163 trial [NCT03493425] closed early; it enrolled only 29 patients,” Barbara Burtness, MD, said to OncLive. Burtness serves as the Anthony N. Brady Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology) at the Yale School of Medicine in New Haven, Connecticut

“It didn’t have the power we initially designed it to have but the difference in structural preservation [between the chemotherapy plus surgery and post-operative radiation therapy (PORT) and surgery plus PORT alone cohorts] was so striking that the data are informative both for practice and for future trials. We also learned that we cannot expect patients to accept the randomization [used in the trial]. Future randomized studies will use upfront systemic therapy. This may be chemotherapy alone vs chemotherapy plus immunotherapy, or maybe chemotherapy vs combination immunotherapy but I don’t think we are going to be in a position to ask patients who require orbital sacrifice or surgery at the base of skull to enter the type of randomization [used in the EA3163 trial] again.”

Novel Targets in Solid Tumors

“It’s interesting to look at some of the new classes of therapies coming into the clinic,” Jonathan H. Strickler, MD, a professor of medicine and a member of the Duke Cancer Institute in Durham, North Carolina, noted during his interview.

“For example, we saw a KRAS degrader and a PRMT5 inhibitor presented. Some of these [agents are directed at] emerging targets that we may hear more about in the years to come. It’s an exciting time for targeting these alterations that we thought were undruggable for many years.”

Closing Thoughts

“The selection of abstracts for, say, a presidential session, or even a proffered paper session, was well done,” Jared Weiss, MD, section chief of Thoracic and Head/Neck Oncology and a professor of medicine at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, said to OncLive.

“But what gets your research there? It gets there if it’s presenting potentially practice-changing, approvable data, if they are paradigm-changing data, and if it’s a big update [with] genuinely new data. However, there are a lot of data in the mini oral and poster sessions that could eventually change the standard of care that are [in those sessions]. [This is] either because they’re from nonrandomized studies that are providing more of a “go” signal for phase 3 [investigation] than changing care immediately or because they’re from small updates from existing studies. However, the agents [evaluated in these studies] can still matter a lot. You can’t editorialize by [what sessions data are presented in]. If you want to keep up in oncology, you must look at all of it.”