Many Great Treatments Available for MCL But Questions About Sequencing Remain, Expert Says

News
Video

In a conversation during the 2022 American Society of Hematology Annual Meeting, an expert from the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, spoke to how treatments have improved for patients with mantle cell lymphoma.

Survival has extended significantly over the years for patients with mantle cell lymphoma as treatments have evolved, but questions around sequencing still remain, according to Hun Ju Lee, MD.

In a conversation with CancerNetwork® during the 2022 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting, Lee, an assistant professor of medicine in the Department of Lymphoma and Myeloma at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, also highlighted the importance of shared decision making when treating this patient population.

Transcript:

Historically, when I was starting off, median overall survival for mantle cell lymphoma was three years. Now, it's [somewhere between] 25 to 30 years given the treatment options. There are so many great treatment options. [As to] how we sequence them is still a key question. Which should come first, and which should come after that?

That is really going to incorporate not just the physicians and the oncologist, but you'll need the patient’s input as to what [adverse] effects they are willing to accept. I recognize the risk is taken by the patient, so they really need to be informed of the of the subtleties of the risk that is involved in selecting treatment options.

Recent Videos
A third of patients had a response [to lifileucel], and of the patients who have a response, half of them were alive at the 4-year follow-up.
We are seeing that, in those patients who have relapsed/refractory melanoma with survival measured as a few weeks and no effective treatments, about a third of these patients will have a response.
We have the current CAR [T-cell therapies], which target CD19; however, we need others.
“Every patient [with multiple myeloma] should be offered CAR T before they’re offered a bispecific, with some rare exceptions,” said Barry Paul, MD.
Barry Paul, MD, listed cilta-cel, anito-cel, and arlo-cel as 3 of the CAR T-cell therapies with the most promising efficacy in patients with multiple myeloma.
Jose Sandoval Sus, MD, discussed standard CAR T-cell therapies in patients across multiple high-risk lymphoma indications.
Elucidating nonresponses to bispecific T-cell engagers may be an important research consideration in the multiple myeloma field.
Barriers to access and financial toxicities are challenges that must be addressed for CAR T-cell therapies in LBCL, according to Jose Sandoval Sus, MD.
Fixed treatment durations with bispecific antibodies followed by observation may help in mitigating infection-related AEs, according to Shebli Atrash, MD.
Related Content