Monitor Toxicities When Treating Breast Cancer With Immunotherapy

The combination of atezolizumab (Tecentriq) and nab-paclitaxel is approved for the treatment of patients with metastatic/advanced triple-negative breast cancer. However, the combination is not without adverse events, explained Leisha A. Emens, MD, PhD, professor of medicine in hematology/oncology, co-leader of the Hillman Cancer Immunology and Immunotherapy Program, and director of translational immunotherapy for the Women's Cancer Research Center (WCRC), at the UPMC Hillman Cancer Center.

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Overall, therapy with atezolizumab and nab-paclitaxel was quite well tolerated. The main side effects are what you would expect with either agent alone.

With regard to immune-related adverse events, which with immunotherapy we always have to be vigilant for because some of them can be quite serious, we didn't actually see a whole lot of grade 3 to 4 immune-related adverse events. The rate of pneumonitis was on the order of 1%-3%. Hepatitis on the order of 1%. The main immune-related adverse event that we saw was low-grade hypothyroidism, grades 1-2. That's quite easily treatable with [ [levothyroxine (Synthroid)]. You just have to recognize the symptoms and then evaluate it with thyroid-function tests and then make the appropriate prescription for synthroid.