Dr. Hussain Discusses Findings With PARP Inhibitors in Prostate Cancer

Maha Hussain, MD, FACP, FASCO, Genevieve Teuton Professor of Medicine, Deputy Director, Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, discusses findings with PARP inhibitors in prostate cancer.

A study in which patients were randomized to abiraterone acetate (Zytiga) plus prednisone, or abiraterone plus prednisone and the PARP inhibitor veliparib showed a slight trend in favor of the combination with the PARP inhibitor, but the results were not statistically significant. At the end of the study, 80 patients with residual metastatic tumor tissue underwent sequencing. Findings showed that patients who had DNA repair defects appeared to do better no matter what treatment they received, irrespective of arm. This is notable, Maha says, because historically, it was thought that patients with prostate cancer who have DNA repair defects do poorly.

These findings have led investigators to create a clinical trial looking at abiraterone or olaparib (Lynparza) or abiraterone plus olaparib in patients with prostate cancer preselected for DNA repair defects.