Dr. Rosenberg on Immunotherapeutic Advances in Bladder Cancer

Jonathan E. Rosenberg, MD, medical oncologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, discusses the emergence of immunotherapies in the field of bladder cancer, including atezolizumab (Tecentriq), nivolumab (Opdivo), and pembrolizumab (Keytruda). Rosenberg shared this at the 2016 OncLive State of the Science Summit on Genitourinary Cancers.

The community has seen a tremendous explosion in potential new treatments for bladder cancer over the last 2 years, Rosenberg says. There are multiple new drugs that are in advanced phase clinical trials, and atezolizumab is the new drug approved in the United States, which is the first PD-L1 inhibitor to be approved. Two to 3 more similar agents are expected to be approved over the next year or so, he adds.

Recently, at the 2016 SITC Annual Meeting, there were data presented on pembrolizumab versus chemotherapy, favoring treatment with the checkpoint inhibitor in these patients. Additionally, recent data with nivolumab has shown substantial activity in a large phase II study that was presented at the 2016 ESMO Congress.

Between these 2 other agents, as well as the PD-L1 inhibitors avelumab and durvalumab that are under investigation, Rosenberg says physicians will have a staple of exciting new drugs that are being tested in this disease.