Are Novel Immunotherapy Combos Effective for Indolent Lymphoma Care?

At the Society of Hematological Oncology 2025 Annual Meeting, Lorenzo Falchi, MD, delivered a presentation titled “Novel Immunotherapy Combinations in Indolent Lymphoma,” wherein he discussed some of the most important areas of care for indolent lymphomas.

He spoke with CancerNetwork® regarding the major takeaways from his speech. The most prominent was that although bispecific antibodies are novel therapies, they are well-known from a pharmacokinetic perspective because they are immunoglobulin-like molecules and are “easy” to combine with other chemotherapy or immunotherapy drugs.

Additionally, thus far, the efficacy observed from novel immunotherapy combinations has been comparable to what current standard-of-care therapies have shown. He noted that findings from several studies have shown these combinations demonstrate similar efficacy. Currently, 5 randomized controlled studies are evaluating chemotherapy-free bispecific antibody combinations vs standard-of-care chemoimmunotherapy.

Falchi is an oncologist and hematologist specializing in lymphoma at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.

Transcript:

The first takeaway was that bispecific antibodies are novel therapies, but from a pharmacokinetic point of view, they are well-known because they are immunoglobulin-like molecules. They are adaptable, versatile, and easy to combine with a variety of partner chemotherapy or immunotherapy agents. It is also particularly easy to combine them because their modes of action tend to be peculiar and distinct from those of other drugs—for example, lenalidomide [Revlimid]—and because their toxicity profiles are largely nonoverlapping with those of other drugs that we combine them with.

The second takeaway is that the type of responses and efficacy that we have seen with these combinations rival what we have in our standard-of-care armamentarium. All the studies that have been conducted have shown that the efficacy of bispecific combinations probably compares favorably to standards of care. On that basis, several randomized controlled trials have been launched to test that hypothesis, both in the relapsed setting and, most recently, in the frontline setting. We have 5 separate randomized controlled trials internationally testing chemotherapy-free bispecific combinations against standard-of-care chemoimmunotherapy. Having done some of the early studies in this space, I have a good feeling about these trials. I am hopeful that we can not only challenge but beat the current standard of care and, once and for all, get rid of cytotoxic conventional chemotherapy for these patients.

References

Falchi L. Novel immunotherapy combinations in indolent lymphoma. Presented at: Society of Hematologic Oncology 2025 Annual Meeting; September 2-6, 2025; Houston, TX.