Chemotherapy and Immunotherapy Combinations are The Future of NSCLC Treatment

Immunotherapy has changed how oncology professionals can approach treatment options for patients with lung cancer, and in the case of patients with resectable non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) immunotherapy combined with chemotherapy in the future cancer care is striving for, according to Catherine Shu, MD.

At the 14^th Annual New York Lung Cancers Symposium Shu, assistant professor of medicine at Columbia University’s Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center, presented on two phase II studies utilizing neoadjuvant chemotherapy and atezolizumab, and carboplatin and nivolumab and their clinical implications for the future of combination therapies. Shu had the chance to sit down with OncLive^®, a sister publication to Oncology Nursing News^®, and discuss the implications and benefits of these trials, and combination therapy in general, for patients with resectable NSCLC.

TRANSCRIPTION

I think that chemo/IO combinations in resectable NSCLC, it's going to be the way of the future. It's a great way to get patients the most advanced treatment we have upfront while they're still able to tolerate it, and if we're able to show that the pathologic response rates are a good surrogate endpoint for survival, then we'll be able to really shorten the time that a clinical trial takes to complete.

That's beneficial to our patients because that means that instead of waiting years and years and years for the trial to finish accruing, and then to report out, we would be able to report out data, basically, after they've completed surgery. So, I think this is the way of the future and I'm very hopeful that patients in the future will have access to this kind of treatment.