Dr. Goy Discusses Ibrutinib With Venetoclax in MCL

Andre Goy, MD, chairman and director, chief of Lymphoma, director of Clinical and Translational Cancer Research at John Theurer Cancer Center, discusses the combination of ibrutinib (Imbruvica) and venetoclax (Venclexta) in the treatment of patients with mantle cell lymphoma (MCL).

This combination is a logical next step because most physicians have experience with ibrutinib as a single agent but when a patient progresses, they progress quickly with a shorter median overall survival. Therefore, it is important that the benefit of ibrutinib is built upon, says Goy. With rituximab (Rituxan), the complete response (CR) rate is much higher, and that has been built upon with R-squared [rituximab plus lenalidomide (Revlimid)] with ibrutinib, which demonstrated a CR rate of 67% to 80% in the relapsed/refractory, heavily pretreated patient population, Goy says.

The combination of venetoclax and ibrutinib is interesting, explains Goy. Venetoclax is the first BCL-2 inhibitor that has shown activity as a single agent in MCL and chronic lymphocytic leukemia, as well as in other lymphomas. This combination is impressive with a CR rate that is over 60% and potentially highly durable. That is where the field is heading in the relapsed/refractory setting, Goy says, and this combination offers an option to control the disease if a patient is chemoresistant after failing chemoimmunotherapy.