Expert Weighs in on Future of CAR T-Cell Therapy Treatment Directions

Kelly L. Garvin, BSN, RN, OCN, H. Lee Moffit Cancer Center, discusses where she hopes to see the direction of chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy go over the next 5 to 10 years, in an interview with Oncology Nursing News®. Garvin recently presented about managing CAR T-cell therapy-related adverse events (AEs) and patient education at the 5th Annual School of Nursing Oncology.

Some of the CAR T-therapy applications that Garvin would like to see include expanded approvals to use the therapy to treat other diseases and other lymphomas, as well as to potentially have the therapy approved as an earlier treatment for patients with TP53 or other biomarkers that suggest they won’t respond well to chemotherapy. One other change Garvin hopes to see is a shortened wait time to get the manufactured T cells ready for the patients.

“Sometimes [the] process takes too long,” she said. “These are patients who have seen multiple lines of therapy. By the time they get to CAR T[-cell therapy], they may not be able to wait the 2, 4, or even 6 weeks it takes to get those T cells manufactured for them. So, one thing we’re looking at is allogeneic T-cell therapy, or off-the-shelf... so we’ll have doner T cells, kind of like how we have donor allogeneic stem cell transplants.”

Overall, Garvin wants nurses to take away the idea that “CAR T[-cell therapy] is huge, it’s exciting, its dynamic, and it’s a very fun place to be in medicine right now and [nurses should] stay tuned­. More is coming down the pipeline.”