EGFR and PTEN mutations predicted an increased risk for death among people receiving immune checkpoint inhibitors for advanced NSCLC, at HRs of 1.67 and 1.55, respectively, while TP53 mutations predicted better survival with chemotherapy (HR=0.86) but worse survival with ALK inhibitors (HR=2.12).

Frédérique Penault-Llorca outlines the importance of the ALK and ROS1 driver alterations in NSCLC and the available methods for their detection

Ross Camidge leads Rosario García Campelo and Yongchang Zhang in a discussion on the detection and treatment of ALK fusion-positive NSCLC in current practice.

Objective We conducted a real-world pharmacovigilance study on psychiatric AEs with marketed ALK inhibitors in subjects with advanced NSCLC.

Their retrospective cohort study included 6297 people who were diagnosed with NSCLC between 1998 and 2020.

medwireNews : Chemoimmunotherapy may be a better option than immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI) monotherapy for advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients with high PD-L1 expression and no KRAS mutations, indicate findings.

West noted that the inclusion of these patients with EGFR - or ALK -mutated disease “provides helpful insight that the benefit seen in this subset of patients on the IMpower150 trial with the combination of carboplatin, paclitaxel, bevacizumab, and atezolizumab may be related to the inclusion of bevacizumab, which was not included in IMpower130.”

In March 2018, the Journal of Thoracic Oncology published results from the cohort investigating the first-line combination of nivolumab 240 mg every 2 weeks plus crizotinib 250 mg twice daily in patients with ALK translocation-positive disease.

Similarly, in the setting of ALK fusion-positive NSCLC replete with a wealth of ALK inhibitors, sequencing of the different ALK inhibitors is an area of active investigation [27].

In July 2018, the EMA gave the nod to first-line pembrolizumab together with pemetrexed and platinum chemotherapy for metastatic nonsquamous NSCLC patients who are negative for EGFR and ALK alterations.

medwireNews : Among Japanese patients with advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) harboring anaplastic lymphoma kinase ( ALK ) translocations, progression-free survival (PFS) is significantly longer with alectinib than crizotinib, shows a head-to-head phase III trial.