Dr. Weber on Emerging Immunotherapy Combinations in Melanoma

Jeffrey S. Weber, MD, PhD, deputy director and co-director of the melanoma program, Laura and Isaac Perlmutter Professor of Oncology, Department of Medicine, NYU Langone’s Perlmutter Cancer Center, 2016 Giant of Cancer Care^® in Melanoma, discusses emerging immunotherapy combinations in melanoma.

The combination of ipilimumab (Yervoy) and nivolumab (Opdivo) is being evaluated in the ongoing phase III CheckMate-915 trial, which enrolled over 1,900 patients with resectable stage IIIB/C/D or stage IV melanoma. Patients will be randomized to receive either the combination or nivolumab alone, says Weber.

Notably, the trial has 2 cohorts of patients: patients with PD-L1—positive tumors and those with PD-L1–negative tumors. The PD-L1–negative cohort was unblinded a couple of months ago; those patients did not benefit from the combination. However, because at least half of the patients enrolled on the trial have PD-L1–positive tumors, the trial will continue, says Weber. The results for this cohort are expected at the end of 2020 or in early 2021, concludes Weber.