Dr. Vokes on the Treatment Landscape of Recurrent Head and Neck Cancer

Everett Vokes, MD, John E. Ultmann Professor of Medicine and Radiation Oncology, physician-in-chief, University of Chicago Medical Center, chair, Department of Medicine, University of Chicago Medicine, discusses the treatment landscape of recurrent head and neck cancer.

The EXTREME regimen, which consists of cetuximab (Erbitux) and a doublet of platinum-based therapy and 5-fluorouracil, is commonly used in this setting, and has shown median survival ranges of approximately 10 months. According to Vokes, many physicians are substituting this triple-drug treatment with a carboplatin-based regimen or with a taxane because of toxicity differences.

However, Vokes characterizes this regimen as “unsatisfying,” which theoretically opens the door for checkpoint inhibitors, a class of drugs that appear to be much more promising for this patient population. The FDA approvals of the PD-L1 inhibitors nivolumab (Opdivo) and pembrolizumab (Keytruda) are expected to help move this treatment landscape forward.