Dr. Wierda Discusses Use of CAR T Cells in CLL

William G. Wierda, MD, PhD, associate professor, Department of Leukemia, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses how chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells could become more effective in the treatment of patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL).

Early data for CAR T-cell therapies in these patients have been shown to elicit lower remission rate of around 30% compared with the 80% remission rate seen in acute lymphoblastic leukemia. However, Wierda says recent findings of research conducted by University of Pennsylvania group demonstrated that T cells collected from patients who were on ibrutinib (Imbruvica) treatment had a higher potency. Ibrutinib is associated with immune-modulating effects that could lead to better outcomes in these patients with CLL.