Ansell, Stephen M.

1633 Background: CAR-T cell therapy has transformed outcomes of hematologic malignancies and is poised to expand into solid malignancies. However, broader use of CAR-T remains constrained by the need for timely cytokine release syndrome (CRS) detection. Current episodic monitoring may miss early physiologic changes. Wearable digital health technologies (DHTs), offering continuous monitoring and real-time alerts, could enable earlier CRS detection, further support outpatient delivery, and expand access to CAR-T and potentially other immunotherapies associated with CRS. Methods: This single-center observational study (NCT05018208) enrolled patients receiving FDA-approved CAR-T products in the outpatient setting at Mayo Clinic, Rochester MN. Management of post-CAR-T complications (e.g. CRS) followed the institution’s standard of care. Patients were monitored from day -5 to day +30 post infusion with intermittent remote patient monitoring (SoC) and an arm-worn wearable device for continuous monitoring (DHT). Patients were included in this analysis if DHT data were available for ≥ 5h of data/day or ≥ 2h of data/night on ≥2 days or nights for baseline and ≥1 day or night within 72h prior to CRS, or at least 2h within 4h of CRS onset, or if DHT was available for ≥7 days/nights post infusion with no CRS event. CRS detection time by DHT was defined as the onset of pyrexia or threshold-based deviation from an individual’s baseline pulse distributions. Results: 32 patients were included in this report (median age 64 years, gender 12 F/20 M, diagnoses 18 MM/14 NHL). 25 patients experienced a CRS event, with maximum CRS grades ranging from 1-3 (16 G1, 8 G2, 1 G3). 24/25 patients with CRS required tocilizumab/steroid. Median CRS onset time was 3.4 days (range 0.4-18.4). 12/32 patients had sufficient DHT data (7 CRS, 5 no CRS) for analysis. 5 patients with CRS had a DHT detection time in advance of the SoC by a median of 13h (range 2.8 - 69.2). The DHT prediction of CRS by baseline HR change was earlier than the first episodic fever by a median of 14.5h (range 13-77.5). The remaining 2/7 patients who did not have CRS detected by the DHT had missing DHT data for more than 45h before a treated CRS event. DHT detected CRS in 2/5 patients without CRS according to SoC. One patient had fever caught with intermittent monitoring. The other was treated for neutropenia fever with suspicion of CRS and/or infection. Conclusions: These results offer evidence that continuous DHT can identify CRS events earlier than intermittent monitoring (SoC). Despite limitations related to compliance with wearable device use and data missingness, and variability in clinical management of CRS, we highlight the usability of DHT and its potential for future studies with optimized strategies to address these limitations. Clinical trial information: NCT05018208 .

1503 Background: CAR T-cell therapy has revolutionized treatment outcomes in hematological malignancies, but has traditionally required inpatient post-infusion monitoring, which is associated with significant cost and time toxicity. Outpatient CAR T infusion and monitoring has been the standard approach at Mayo Clinic site in Rochester, MN, with demonstrated feasibility and safety (Bansal et al., ASCO 2023). We present data comparing healthcare utilization between CAR T recipients who underwent outpatient remote monitoring and those with traditional inpatient monitoring. Methods: Electronic medical records were retrospectively analyzed for 293 patients who received CAR T-cell therapy for a hematological malignancy at any of the 3 Mayo Clinic sites (MN, AZ, FL) between 2020 and 2024 . Healthcare utilization was compared between patients who received outpatient CAR T with remote patient monitoring in Rochester, MN (N = 125) and those who received inpatient CAR T in the Arizona (n = 90) and Florida (n = 78) sites. Per protocol, patients in the inpatient group underwent mandatory inpatient monitoring for 7 days, with extension per provider discretion. Data was analyzed through Chi-Square and Wilcoxon tests. P values < 0.05 were considered statistically significant. Results: There was no significant difference in baseline sex, age, ethnicity, LDH, platelets, or neutrophils among the 293 patients. Diagnoses included lymphoma (n = 175), multiple myeloma (n = 106), and B-ALL (n = 12). The most common CAR T-cell products used were axicabtagene ciloleucel (n = 138) idecabtagene vicleucel (n = 56), and ciltacabtagene autoleucel (n = 50). Median hospital days were lower in the outpatient group vs the inpatient group at 30 days (4.4 vs 13.3, P < 0.001) and 90 days (4.6 vs 13.6, P < 0.001). ICU admission occurred in 1 outpatient patient ( < 1%) vs 18 inpatient patients (11%) in the first 30 days (P < 0.001). In the first 30 days, 22% of patients in the outpatient group did not require hospitalization, while 56%, 15%, and 6% required 1, 2, and 3 hospitalizations, respectively. Similarly, only 11 (8.8%) patients in the outpatient group had ≥1 ED visit in the first 30 days compared with 32 (20%) pts in the inpatient group (P = 0.009). At 30 days, there was no difference in patient portal use, with 58% of patients using the portal at least once and a median of 1 message in both groups. Within the first 30 days, 53% and 2% of patients in the outpatient group required 1 and 2 outpatient visits, respectively, vs 29% and 2% in the inpatient group (P < 0.001). There was no difference in 30-day mortality (1.6% outpatient vs 2.4% in inpatient) between the 2 groups (P = 1.00) Conclusions: Outpatient CAR T-cell therapy monitoring was associated with significantly fewer hospital days without increased ED visits, ICU stays, portal use, or 30-day mortality. This demonstrates lower healthcare utilization for outpatient CAR-T therapy.

Background/Objectives: Racial/ethnic and regional disparities in neoplasm-related mortality remain a significant public health challenge. In this study, we aimed to evaluate long-term trends in county-level neoplasm-related mortality rates by race/ethnicity in the United States and examine associations with social determinants of health. Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional ecological study using population-based data from the Global Burden of Disease Study, including individuals residing in 50 states of the United States and the District of Columbia from 2000 to 2019. We analyzed age-standardized neoplasm-related mortality rates by ethnicity/race. Joinpoint regression analysis was used to identify significant changes in mortality trends, summarized as average annual percentage change. County-level correlations between mortality and key social determinants of health were also assessed. Results: Neoplasm-related mortality rates declined across all racial/ethnic groups from 2000 to 2019; however, disparities persisted. The age-standardized neoplasm-related mortality rates per 100,000 population decreased in all racial/ethnic subgroups. The average annual percentage change ranged from −0.94% (Hispanic and non-Hispanic American Indian or Alaska Native) to −1.90% (Black). Sex-specific analyses revealed similar trends. Southeastern states experienced slower declines than Northeastern states did. County-level smoking and poverty rates were positively correlated, whereas the primary care physician-to-population ratio, excessive alcohol consumption rate, mammography screening rate, and median household income were inversely correlated with neoplasm-related mortality rate, varying by race/ethnicity. Conclusions: Targeted, community-specific interventions are required to reduce inequities in cancer outcomes.

Summary Chimeric antigen receptor T cells directed against CD‐19 are highly effective therapies for various subtypes of B‐cell non‐Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL). We have studied the impact of patient‐specific lymphocyte growth kinetics after lymphoid depletion chemotherapy on both long‐term outcomes and toxicity in patients with diffuse large B‐cell non‐Hodgkin lymphoma (DLBCL). The growth of the lymphocyte populations early after chimeric antigen receptor T‐cell (CAR‐T) therapy is well described by an exponential function and the growth rate of the cells appears to be one of the most critical determinants of overall survival in these patients. The maximum lymphocyte peak and the area under curve for lymphocytes within the first 4 weeks after CAR‐T therapy had no impact on survival. Receiver operator characteristic analysis determined that a replication rate ≥0.3876/day is associated with superior rates of complete response and durable responses. This threshold is associated with higher grades of cytokine release syndrome and the need for tocilizumab. However, patients with this threshold have a median overall survival of 3.04 years compared to 1.035 years for patients with slower lymphocyte replication ( p = 0.0206). The major determinant of depth of response and durability of response to CAR‐T in NHL is the speed of lymphocyte expansion.

Abstract Large Language Models (LLM) are being widely adopted into the medical field for their impressive ability to analyze and summarize large amounts of text data. These models enable clinicians and researchers to extract meaningful insights from complex datasets and may assist with decision making. Here we present our workflows and application of LLM for the interpretation and summarization of clinical data related to CAR-T cell therapy. Using an LLM (Gemini 2.5 pro) in the Google Cloud Computing (GCP) environment, two applications were developed to analyze CAR-T cell therapy clinical data: 1) extracting and summarizing CRS and ICANS event-related data to streamline the compliance team workflow, and 2) identifying features available at time of CAR-T infusion able to classify patients into high- or low-monitoring needs 14 days post CAR-T. Patient data (vitals, labs, hematology notes, and EKGs) were extracted from the electronic medical record (EMR) using Google BigQuery into SQL tables in GCP. For each application, relevant data fields were retrieved, formatted into JSON objects, and embedded in the LLM prompt for context-aware processing. Both applications have undergone iterative prompt engineering after analyzing the LLM output against ground truth data in the EMR. For the application extracting and summarizing CRS and ICANS events, the LLM was optimized on Mayo Clinic Rochester data. When compared to the IEC compliance database, the LLM achieved 100% accuracy and F1 score for CRS events, and 96% accuracy and 82% F1 score for ICANS events. The match rate for CRS and ICANS grades were 83% and 89% respectively. We applied the same LLM to Mayo Clinic Arizona (MCA) and Mayo Clinic Florida (MCF) cases, who document clinical notes and toxicity flowsheet differently, and achieved an accuracy (MCA: 93%, MCF:93%) and F1 score (MCA: 96%, MCF: 96%) for CRS and accuracy (MCA: 81%, MCF:82%) and F1 score (MCA: 76%, MCF: 75%) for ICANS. LLM was able to capture events missed by manual reviews. For most of the discrepancies where compliance team final adjudication is needed, LLM will be updated to flag discrepancies for review by the compliance team. For the application related to the monitoring needs 14 days post CAR-T, the LLM identified 5 categories predictive of high or low monitoring needs post CAR-T infusion (disease status, inflammatory and tumor burden markers, hematologic status, renal function and performance status). Our model achieved a sensitivity of 85.7%, specificity of 23.8%, and F1 score of 65.5% for our first cohort, compared with data extracted by the LLM from the EMR. For our second cohort, with demographics statistically similar to cohort 1 and using the same 5 categories, the LLM achieved a sensitivity of 83.3%, a specificity of 28.6%, and F1 score of 65.4%. Our workflow and applications of LLM’s provide examples and guidance to others interested in applying LLM’s for clinical and research applications. Citation Format: Emmanuel Contreras Guzman, Matthew Jankowski, Andre De Menezes Silva Corraes, Malvika Gupta, Monica L. Shaw, Madiha Iqbal, Talal Hilal, Saurabh Chhabra, Ricardo Daniel Parrondo, Jody K. Mclean, Kim R. Riester, Kayla Joseph, Melinda Tan, Holly Ross, Cleyonia Barnett, Sylvia Carter, Semy Girmay, Rachel Wolan, Milana Ramsey, Christian Downhour, Kristy Morgan, Shae Sibley, Erica Rushing, Lucy Holmes, Allison Burgstahler, Stephen M. Ansell, Hassan Alkhateeb, Matthew Hathcock, Ramona Bruno, Allison C. Rosenthal, Hemant Murthy, Patrick B. Johnston, Jonas Paludo, Yi Lin. Applications of large language models to CAR-T cell therapy clinical data using Google cloud computing [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2026; Part 1 (Regular Abstracts); 2026 Apr 17-22; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2026;86(7 Suppl):Abstract nr 2740.

Abstract Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy achieves high response rates in relapsed/refractory aggressive B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma, yet only 40% of patients achieve durable remission. Identifying biological programs linked to long-term response remains critical. As metabolic fitness underlies T-cell persistence and effector function, we profiled metabolic pathways associated with clinical outcomes following commercial CD19 CAR T-cell therapy. Single-cell RNA sequencing of peripheral blood mononuclear cells collected at baseline (BL), peak CAR-T expansion (PK), and one-month post-infusion (M1) was analyzed using CellRanger v7.0.1, immunopipe. Seurat v4.3.0 was applied for unsupervised clustering to delineate cell subsets based on top differentially expressed genes. Patients were categorized as durable complete remission (CR ≥6 months; n = 16), primary refractory (PD1; n = 4), or relapse after initial response (PD2; n = 12). Gene-set enrichment analysis defined metabolic pathway activity across T-cell, monocyte, dendritic cell (DC), and natural killer (NK) subsets. Oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) emerged as the dominant metabolic program distinguishing clinical outcomes. At BL and PK, OXPHOS was consistently enriched in PD1 relative to CR across T-cell, monocyte, and DC subsets, suggesting early oxidative activation in non-responders. By M1, this pattern inverted, with higher OXPHOS activity in CR. PD2 largely paralleled PD1, but several subsets including CD8 T central memory, classical monocytes TGFβ, intermediate monocytes CD38, monocytic myeloid-derived suppressor cell (mMDSC) HIF1A, and mMDSC SIRPA, showed OXPHOS enrichment in CR at BL and/or PK that persisted through M1. In contrast, DC and NK subsets exhibited the opposite pattern: OXPHOS was enriched in CR at PK (conventional DC 2 (cDC2), plasmacytoid DC (pDC), NK, proliferating NK), but shifted toward enrichment in PD2 at M1 (cDC2, NK, NK CD56bright). Glycolysis (GLY) followed a similar trajectory in monocytes and NK cells, with enrichment in PD1/PD2 at BL and PK, followed by enrichment in CR at M1. In T-cells, PD1 maintained GLY enrichment from BL through PK, with no significant differences observed at M1. The inositol-phosphate metabolism pathway showed a more static pattern and was consistently enriched in multiple PD2 effector and memory T-cell subsets without reversal at M1. Taken together, these data reveal distinct, lineage-specific metabolic signatures that differentiate durable remission from early and late progression. Dynamic OXPHOS and GLY programming, characterized by lower activity early and enhanced activity at M1 in CR, may reflect adaptive metabolic programming that supports sustained antitumor immunity. Immune-metabolic profiling may therefore serve as a biomarker of response and highlight actionable metabolic pathways to enhance CAR T-cell durability. Citation Format: Melinda S.Y. Tan, Panwen Wang, Patrizia Mondello, Jacqueline Turner, Andre de Menezes Silva Corraes, Chen Wu, Zuoyi Shao, Kevin Regan, Ma Audrey, Arushi Khurana, Nora N. Benanni, Yucai Wang, Paul Hampel, Jonas Paludo, Saad J. Kenderian, Urshila Durani, Patrick B. Johnston, Jose Caetano Villasboas, Stephen M. Ansell, Ying Li, Haidong Dong, Hu Zeng, Yi Lin. Metabolic pathway signatures defining response to CD19 CAR T-Cell therapy in aggressive B-cell non-hodgkin lymphoma [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2026; Part 1 (Regular Abstracts); 2026 Apr 17-22; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2026;86(7 Suppl):Abstract nr 3278.

Abstract Introduction: Therapeutic outcomes in B-cell non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma (B-NHL) have substantially improved with the introduction of chimeric antigen receptor T-cell (CAR-T) therapy. Yet, persistent immune dysfunction and underlying metabolic dysregulation remain major obstacles to achieving durable clinical responses in B-NHL. We hypothesize that mitochondrial pathways play a critical role in mediating anti-tumor immunity during CAR-T therapy. Methods: Peripheral blood mononuclear cells were collected from healthy controls (CNTRL, n=5) and patients with advanced stage lymphoma (LYM) who received FDA approved CAR-T (n=32). Samples were collected before lymphodepletion (BL), at peak CAR-T expansion (PK) and one-month post-infusion (M1). Single-cell RNA sequencing was used to interrogate differential mitochondrial gene expression. Samples were obtained from LYM patients with complete remission for &gt;6 months (CR), primary refractory (PD1), or relapsed (PD2) disease. Results: Compared to CNTRLs, LYM patients exhibited reduced expression of cytochrome c oxidase. At BL, CR patients demonstrated broader mitochondrial differential gene expression across all T-cell subsets relative to PD1 and PD2 and showed higher expression of MT-ATP-6, MT-ATP-8, and MT-CO3. Following CAR-T infusion, global mitochondrial gene expression increased across patients corresponding with expansion of CD8 effector T cells (Tem tumor circulating) and activated peripheral memory T cells (Tpm). Certain mitochondrial genes, such as MT-CO1, were durably expressed across LYM patients at BL, PK, and M1 in peripheral and central memory T cells (Tpm, Tcm). At PK, cytochrome c oxidase and ATP synthase genes were upregulated in CR Tpm and Tcm. At M1, MT-ATP-6, MT-ATP-8, MT-CO3 were significantly upregulated in CD8 memory precursor effector T-cells (MPECs) of CR patients compared to both PD1 and PD2. While CR and PD2 patients appeared clinically responsive at M1, CR samples maintained significantly higher MT-ATP-8 expression across T cell subsets (CD8 MPECS, Tpm, Tcm) compared to PD2 (p values 0.008; &lt;0.0001; &lt;0.0001). Conclusions: We report a temporal shift in immunometabolism with CAR-T therapy in LYM. Clinical responders exhibited sustained mitochondrial activity characterized by persistent expression of ATP synthase in CD8 MPECs and cytochrome c oxidase in Tpm and Tcm. In sum, mitochondrial programming may distinguish effective versus dysfunctional T cells and identify targets for therapeutic development. Citation Format: Jacqueline Turner, Panwen Wang, Patrizia Mondello, Melinda Tan, Christoph Schaefers, Chen Wu, Andre de Menezes Silva Corraes, Kevin Regan, Zuoyi Shao, Ma Audrey, Arushi Khurana, Nora N. Benanni, Yucai Wang, Paul Hampel, Saad J. Kenderian, Jonas Paludo, Urshila Durani, Patrick B. Johnston, Jose Caetano Villasboas, Stephen M. Ansell, Haidong Dong, Ying Li, Zeng Hu, Yi Lin. Mitochondrial transcriptome profiles associated with clinical responses to CAR-T therapy in aggressive lymphoma [abstract]. In: Proceedings of the American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting 2026; Part 1 (Regular Abstracts); 2026 Apr 17-22; San Diego, CA. Philadelphia (PA): AACR; Cancer Res 2026;86(7 Suppl):Abstract nr 1213.

Abstract Use of brentuximab vedotin (BV) and PD-1 monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) before autologous stem cell transplantation (ASCT) could impact the benefit of post-ASCT BV maintenance in relapsed/refractory (R/R) classic Hodgkin lymphoma (cHL). We identified 1091 patients with R/R cHL who underwent ASCT between 2010-2022. In total, 244 (22%) received a PD-1 mAb and 443 (41%) received BV before ASCT, while 305 (28%) received BV maintenance. We performed 1:1 propensity score matching to assess the efficacy of BV maintenance in different patient subgroups. Among 608 matched patients, the 3-year progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival were 73% (95% confidence interval [CI], 70-78) and 95% (95%CI, 93-97), respectively. BV maintenance was associated with improved PFS for patients with no exposure to novel agents, especially those with 2+ modified AETHERA risk factors (0-1 factors: hazard ratio (HR), 0.51; 95%CI, 0.24-1.09; P =.083; 2+ factors: HR, 0.40; 95%CI, 0.25-0.65; P&lt; .001). In contrast, BV maintenance was not associated with a significant PFS benefit for any patient subgroup who received novel agents before ASCT (BV-treated, 0-1: HR, 1.43; 95%CI, 0.53-3.81; P =.48; 2+: HR, 0.79; 95%CI, 0.34-1.82; P =.58; PD-1-treated, 0-1 [P&gt;.99], 2+: HR, 0.25; 95%CI, 0.03-2.14; P =.21). In particular, we observed excellent outcomes for patients undergoing ASCT in a complete response after one line of PD-1-based salvage treatment with no significant benefit for BV maintenance observed (2-year PFS 100% vs 95%; P&gt;.99). The benefit of BV maintenance appears to be attenuated for patients receiving novel agents with salvage therapy. Omission of BV maintenance should be considered for patients anticipated to have excellent outcomes.

ABSTRACT Soluble tumor necrosis factor receptor 2 (sTNFR2) is a member of the TNF superfamily whose normal bodily distribution is largely limited to low level expression on lymphoid cells. It has emerged as an important inducible receptor that activates a signaling pathway for cancer growth. We evaluated sTNFR2 as a prognostic biomarker for overall survival (OS) in newly diagnosed lymphoma using a prospective cohort study with banked pretreatment serum samples. sTNFR2 was higher in 1513 lymphoma patients compared to 499 age and sex matched controls ( p < 0.0001). Using Kaplan–Meier curves and Cox proportional hazards models to estimate hazard ratios [HR] (high vs. low tertile), higher levels of sTNFR2 at diagnosis were associated with inferior OS across all seven major lymphoma subtypes: Hodgkin lymphoma ( p < 0.0001; HR = 12.6), diffuse large B‐cell lymphoma ( p < 0.0001; HR = 2.6), follicular lymphoma ( p = 0.00017; HR = 2.5), mantle cell lymphoma ( p < 0.0001; HR = 4.2), small lymphocytic lymphoma ( p = 0.012; HR = 2.4), marginal zone lymphoma ( p = 0.0012; HR = 3.1), and T‐cell lymphoma ( p < 0.0001; HR = 3.1). Using CITE‐seq profiling of tumor microenvironment tissue, we sought to identify cellular source(s) of circulating sTNFR2. In tumor tissue from follicular lymphoma, high TNFR2‐expressing cells were found to be T‐regulatory (Treg) cells, suggestive of a Treg‐driven cancer. In tissue from a case of marginal zone lymphoma, high TNFR2 expression was found on CD4+ and CD8+ T cells, B cells, and monocytes but also directly on tumor cells. We conclude sTNRF2 is a strong prognostic biomarker of OS across major lymphoma subtypes and may be useful to guide therapeutic choices, including targeted therapies against immunosuppressive TNFR2‐expressing Tregs.