Dr. Bauml on HPV Vaccination for Head and Neck Cancer

Joshua Bauml, MD, assistant professor, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, discusses HPV vaccination for patients with HPV-related head and neck cancer.

In HPV-related cancers, there are predictable epitopes that can be targeted. There was a study that investigated a therapeutic vaccine that targeted E6 and E7. This study was able to show that immune responses were quite common in patients with head and neck cancer who received this HPV vaccine in the adjuvant setting.

There will be a study that combines this therapeutic vaccine with PD-1/PD-L1 inhibition, which is an exciting next step, according to Bauml. Since there are reliable epitopes in head and neck cancer, such as HPV and Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), this is a space where cellular therapies can be used. For example, cellular therapies such as T-cell receptor therapies or chimeric antigen receptor T-based therapies are options that Bauml hopes to explore in the future.