Liquid biopsies, which are blood tests that detect circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA), may be able to identify advanced non-small cell lung cancer patients who could benefit from additional drugs during immunotherapy treatment, according to a phase 2 clinical trial. The trial, led by investigators at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center, BC Cancer, and the Canadian Cancer trials Group, found that ctDNA analyses can serve as an early marker of immunotherapy response and may help guide therapy. The results, published in Nature Medicine, suggest that liquid biopsies could be used to determine which patients are benefiting from immunotherapies and may serve as a new endpoint for clinical trials testing these treatments. Liquid biopsies offer a minimally invasive way to track patients’ responses to treatment and could help identify individuals at high risk of disease progression who might benefit from a change in their therapeutic regimen. The trial is ongoing, and the investigators will evaluate the potential clinical benefit of tailoring treatment based on ctDNA responses in the second stage of the trial.
A phase 2 clinical trial led by investigators at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center has shown that liquid biopsies, blood tests that measure circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA), can be used to identify non-small cell lung cancer patients who may benefit from additional drugs during immunotherapy. The trial, called BR.36, found that ctDNA analysis using next-generation sequencing captured immunotherapy responses early, within an average of eight weeks after treatment started. The results suggest that ctDNA analyses could be used as an early marker of immunotherapy response and may help guide therapy, especially for patients with stable disease on imaging. The BR.36 trial will move forward with the second stage, in which treatment will be tailored for patients based on their ctDNA responses. The trial is being funded by the Cancer Research Institute, the Mark Foundation for Cancer Research, and Personal Genome Diagnostics. The results of the trial were published in the journal Nature Medicine.
