Dr. Eyre on Results of Venetoclax in Relapsed/Refractory MCL

Toby Eyre, MBChB, MRCP, consultant hematologist at Oxford University Hospitals NHS Trust, discusses the results of single-agent venetoclax (Venclexta) in patients with relapsed/refractory mantle cell lymphoma (MCL).

There remains an area of unmet need for patients with MCL who relapse after treatment with a BTK inhibitor. In a retrospective study, venetoclax monotherapy induced an overall response rate of 60% in patients with poor-risk relapsed/refractory MCL previously treated with a BTK inhibitor.

Data has been collected on 20 patients, and the response rate is 60% with a complete response rate of 20%. Eyre says that the progression-free survival (PFS) is still fairly limited at just over 3 months, and the overall survival is about 9 months. The drug was well tolerated, Eyre adds, but work still needs to be done in this difficult-to-treat population.

This study utilized the UK Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency compassionate use scheme, which Eyre says often includes patients in pretty dire states of disease. In this study in particular, patients had poor-risk clinical features, including a PFS of 4.8 with prior BTK inhibitor therapy.