Kozono, David

Importance Preoperative and perioperative nivolumab improve event-free survival in resectable non–small cell lung cancer. The role of adjuvant nivolumab after upfront surgery is unknown. Objective To determine whether adjuvant nivolumab improves disease-free survival and overall survival in patients with resected non–small cell lung cancer with any tumor programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) expression and in those with at least 50% PD-L1 expression. Design, Setting, and Participants This open-label, randomized phase 3 study enrolled participants from May 2016 through September 2019, with median follow-up of 72.6 months at the data cutoff in December 2025. The study was conducted at 378 centers in the US National Clinical Trials Network. Patients were identified through a screening trial. Those with resected tumors at least 4 cm and/or who were lymph node positive (N1/N2) were eligible for inclusion after completion of planned standard adjuvant therapy if the tumor was adenocarcinoma without sensitizing sequence variants in EGFR and ALK or squamous cell carcinoma. Intervention Patients were randomized in a 1:1 ratio to receive nivolumab 480 mg intravenously every 4 weeks for up to 1 year or standard care observation. Main Outcomes and Measures Co–primary end points were disease-free survival in the intention-to-treat population and in those with tumoral PD-L1 expression at least 50%. Overall survival was examined if the corresponding test of disease-free survival was statistically significant. Results A total of 466 patients (median age, 66 years; 241 [52%] male) were assigned to receive nivolumab and 469 (median age, 67 years; 245 [52%] male) to undergo standard care observation. The median duration of follow-up was 72.6 months. The trial was stopped for futility at 75% information. In the intention-to-treat population, median disease-free survival was 71.3 months with nivolumab and 68.8 months with observation (hazard ratio for progression or death, 0.97 [97% CI, 0.79-1.20]; [95% CI, 0.81-1.17]; 1-sided P = .39). In the subset of participants with PD-L1 of at least 50%, median disease-free survival was 89.8 months with nivolumab and 78.5 months with observation (hazard ratio for progression or death, 0.86 [98% CI, 0.55-1.34]; [95% CI, 0.59-1.25]; 1-sided P = .22). Conclusions and Relevance Adjuvant nivolumab was not associated with improved disease-free survival in patients with resected non–small cell lung cancer without sensitizing EGFR and ALK alterations when given after planned adjuvant chemotherapy and/or radiotherapy. Trial Registration Clinicaltrials.gov Identifier: NCT02595944

8057 Background: The NCI Adjuvant Lung Cancer Enrichment Marker Identification and Sequencing Trials (ALCHEMIST) study tested resected stage II-IIIB(N2) NSCLC for targetable EGFR and ALK alterations and PD-L1 expression to screen patients for biomarker-driven adjuvant therapy trials (NCT02194738). Local lab results were requested when available for comparison to central lab results. Methods: We identified patients with both central and local PD-L1 results in the ALCHEMIST adjuvant immunotherapy study screening population. Discrepancies in tumor proportion score (TPS) between central and local PD-L1 were defined using prespecified cut-points (granular: <1%, 1-<5%, 5-<10%, 10-<20%, 20-<30%, 30-<40%, 40-<50%, 50-60%, 60-<70%, 70-<80%, 80-<90%, 90-<100%; clinical: <1%, 1-<50%, 50-100%). Large discrepancies were defined as ≥ 50 percentage point differences; for these cases, local PD-L1 and hematoxylin & eosin-stained slides were requested. These and all central slides were digitally scanned at 40X. Three expert pathologists reviewed the scanned slides in a blinded fashion. Differences between patient or tumor characteristics were assessed by Chi-square and Wilcoxon rank sum tests. Percent agreement was computed within and between the reviewers. Results: Central and local PD-L1 results were available for 497 patients. 177 cases (36%) had discrepancies that placed patients in different clinical TPS categories (<1%, 1-<50%, 50-100%). Among these, 43 cases had large TPS discrepancies; 14 had available local testing slides. 46 of the 320 cases without discrepancy were randomly selected as controls. No patient or tumor characteristics were associated with discrepancy, including tumor location, histology, grade or cancer stage (p > 0.05). Pairwise comparisons of TPS according to three pathologists re-reading the same scanned PD-L1 slides showed similar levels of disagreement in clinical TPS category whether there was initial discrepancy between central and local results (24%, 34%, and 23%; mean 27%) or not (33%, 30%, and 20%; mean 28%). Among the 14 cases with large initial discrepancies and local slides available, there was agreement in clinical TPS category when the anonymized central and local scanned slides were re-read by the pathologists in 54%, 38%, and 43% of cases, despite 100% non-agreement in initial reads. There were higher rates of agreement when the tested slides both originated from the same (100%) versus different (35%) blocks, when the same (48%) versus different (40%) PD-L1 antibodies were used, and when the cases were of non-squamous (52%) versus squamous (14%) cell carcinoma. Conclusions: There are substantial differences in PD-L1 TPS read by pathologists that can result in placement of patients in different categories commonly used for clinical management. These differences have clear implications in clinical trials and routine patient care.

8001 Background: The ALCHEMIST clinical trial platform, launched by the National Clinical Trials Network (NCTN) in 2014, screened patients with resected non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) for molecular markers and tailored post-operative adjuvant therapy trials. A081105 evaluated whether adjuvant erlotinib improved overall survival (OS) following complete resection in patients with early stage EGFR mutated lung adenocarcinoma. Methods: A081105 was a randomized phase III trial enrolling patients with completely resected stage IB (≥4 cm), II, or IIIA non-squamous NSCLC (per the 7 th TNM staging classification) harboring EGFR exon 19 deletion or L858R mutations. Patients were randomized 1:1 to erlotinib 150 mg daily for up to 2 years or placebo/observation, stratified by stage, prior chemotherapy, EGFR mutation subtype, and ECOG performance status. The primary endpoint was OS in the per-protocol (PP) population with centrally confirmed EGFR mutations, designed to detect a hazard ratio (HR) of 0.67 in favor of erlotinib with a power of 86% and one sided type I error rate of 5%. Secondary endpoints included OS and disease free survival (DFS) in a modified intent-to-treat (mITT) population with local or centrally confirmed EGFR mutations, and safety. A prespecified backstop analysis was conducted after a minimum of 5 years of follow-up on all patients. Results: Trial enrollment was discontinued when 390 of the intended 450 patients had been enrolled due to the proven benefit of adjuvant osimertinib. Among 390 enrolled patients, the arms were balanced for age (median: 67.0 years), sex (70% female), race (70% white), stage (II: 51%, IIIA: 37%), prior chemotherapy (82%), ECOG PS 0 (60%), and exon 19 deletion (57%). Adjuvant erlotinib did not significantly improve OS compared with placebo/observation in the overall PP population (364 patients, 108 events, HR 0.89; 95% CI, 0.59–1.34; 1-sided P = 0.29) or within exon 19 deletion (HR: 0.94) or L858R mutation (HR: 0.82) subgroups. Five-year OS rates were 78.6% versus 77.9%, respectively. Results were consistent in the mITT analysis (379 patients, 113 events, HR 0.86; 95% CI, 0.58–1.28). Erlotinib improved DFS (mITT: 181 events, median: 68 vs 50 months, HR 0.74; 95% CI, 0.55–1.01). Across both arms, 11% of patients started non-protocol treatment (Osimertinib: 9%) prior to disease progression, and 9% withdrew consent for all follow-up prior to recurrence. In the erlotinib arm, 3 deaths on study were reported; grade 3 or higher adverse events were reported on 39% of patients. Median duration of treatment on Erlotinib arm was 16 months; only 37% of patients completed the planned treatment. Conclusions: In resected EGFR -mutant NSCLC, adjuvant erlotinib did not improve overall survival but improved DFS. Additional studies are exploring efficacy in selected subsets of patients using genomics and proteomic analyses. Clinical trial information: NCT02193282 .

8000 Background: The NCI’s ALCHEMIST program has screened thousands of patients with resected lung adenocarcinoma for mutations in EGFR and ALK. EA5142 studied the efficacy of adjuvant nivolumab after standard of care adjuvant therapy in patients with resected lung adenocarcinoma without sensitizing EGFR and ALK alterations and squamous cell carcinoma. Methods: Patients enrolled in the ALCHEMIST screening trial (A151216) with resected NSCLC tumors at least 4 cm and/or lymph node positive (N1/2) (for lung adenocarcinoma, without sensitizing EGFR and ALK alterations), were centrally tested for tumor cell PD-L1 expression using the DAKO 28-8 clone. After completion of all planned adjuvant therapy (chemotherapy and/or post-operative radiation) patients were randomized 1:1 to adjuvant nivolumab 480 mg IV every 4 weeks for up to 1 year or best supportive care. Patients were stratified by tumor histology, stage (AJCC 7 th edition IB/IIA vs IIB/IIIA), prior adjuvant treatment, and PD-L1 status (<1% vs ≥1%). The primary study endpoints were disease free survival (DFS) in all patients and in patients with high tumor PD-L1 expression (≥50%). Overall survival was powered to be tested hierarchically, if DFS was positive. Results: Between July 2016 and October 2019, 935 patients were randomized across 378 sites. The treatment arms were balanced for age (median 66 years), sex (52% male), smoking status (10% never smoked), histology (29% squamous), stage and PD-L1 expression (29% PD-L1 high). With a median follow-up of 72.6 months, nivolumab did not improve DFS in the intention to treat population (median DFS 71.3 months vs. 68.8 months in observation arm), hazard ratio (HR) 0.97 (95% CI 0.81-1.17, p=0.78) or the PD-L1 ≥50% subset (median DFS 89.8 months vs. 78.5 months in observation arm), HR 0.86 (95% CI 0.59-1.25, p=0.43). In multivariate analysis, adjusting for age, gender, and smoking history, the DFS HR was 0.99 (95% CI 0.82-1.19, p=0.89) in all randomized patients and 0.82 (95% CI 0.56-1.2, p=0.31) in the PD-L1 ≥50% subset. As the primary recurrence endpoint included any lung cancer, including new primaries, a sensitivity analysis was performed excluding new primary lung cancers, DFS HR 0.97 (95% CI 0.80-1.18, p=0.76) in all patients and HR 0.88 (95% CI 0.60-1.30, p=0.52 in the ≥50% subset. The median duration of treatment with adjuvant nivolumab was 9.4 months (range 0-12.7 months). The most common reasons for nivolumab discontinuation were adverse event (29%), patient withdrawal (11%), and disease progression while on treatment (10%). Treatment related grade 3-5 toxicities were reported in 25% of patients: Grade 3: 23%, Grade 4: 2%, Grade 5: <1%. Conclusions: In patients with resected NSCLC (≥4cm or LN+, EGFR/ALK -) adjuvant nivolumab did not improve DFS, irrespective of tumor PD-L1 expression. Clinical trial information: NCT02595944 .

PURPOSE Stereotactic radiation (SRS/SRT) as opposed to whole-brain radiation (WBRT) represents the standard of care for patients with a limited number of brain metastases given the relatively favorable toxicity profile associated with stereotactic treatment. However, in patients with small cell lung cancer (SCLC), WBRT remains standard because of a lack of prospective data supporting SRS/SRT and concerns related to intracranial progression and neurologic death when WBRT is omitted. We conducted a single-arm, multicenter, phase II trial of SRS/SRT in patients with SCLC and 1-10 brain metastases to assess neurologic death rates relative to historical controls managed with WBRT (ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT03391362 ). METHODS Patients were eligible if they had SCLC or an extrathoracic small cell primary and 1-10 brain metastases. Previous brain-directed radiation including prophylactic cranial irradiation was not permitted. Neurologic death was defined as marked, progressive, radiographic brain progression accompanied by corresponding neurologic symptomatology without systemic disease progression or systemic symptoms of a life-threatening nature. Close imaging-based surveillance of the brain post-SRS/SRT was used. RESULTS Between February 2018 and April 2023, 100 patients were enrolled. The median number of brain metastases was 2 (IQR, 1-4; range, 1-10). The median overall survival was 10.2 months; only 22% of patients required salvage WBRT. In total, 20 neurologic deaths were observed, relative to 64 non-neurologic deaths. The neurologic death rate at 1 year was 11.0% (95% CI, 5.8 to 18.1); the historical rate in patients managed with WBRT was 17.5%. CONCLUSION Our prospective, multi-institutional study demonstrated low rates of neurologic death when SRS/SRT as opposed to WBRT is used in patients with SCLC and 1-10 brain metastases who are surveilled closely post-treatment, supporting the utility of stereotactic approaches in this population.

TPS8113 Background: There are currently three approved approaches for patients with resectable NSCLC including neoadjuvant chemoimmunotherapy, adjuvant chemoimmunotherapy and perioperative treatment with neoadjuvant chemoimmunotherapy followed by adjuvant immunotherapy. All regimens were approved after showing event-free survival (EFS) or disease-free survival (DFS) benefit with the addition of immunotherapy to chemotherapy compared to chemotherapy alone. Each approach has its benefits and risks. Starting immunotherapy prior to surgery may improve treatment compliance and efficacy of immunotherapy. Nevertheless, neoadjuvant chemoimmunotherapy may result in missing an opportunity for curative surgery and increase the complexity of tumor resection. PROSPECT-LUNG (NCT06632327) is a randomized study evaluating whether starting chemoimmunotherapy before or after surgery leads to better outcomes. Methods: This is a randomized phase 3 trial in which patients will be randomized 1:1 to surgery followed by chemoimmunotherapy (adjuvant arm) or neoadjuvant chemoimmunotherapy followed by surgery and adjuvant therapy (perioperative arm). Patients with histologic or cytologic confirmation of surgically resectable stage IIA-IIIB NSCLC (per AJCC 9th edition) or stage IIA to IIIB per AJCC 8 th edition up to single ipsilateral mediastinal station (N2a), ECOG PS ≤ 2 (or Karnofsky ≥ 60%), no prior treatment for NSCLC and no previous malignancy within 3 years are eligible. The dual primary endpoints are real-world event free survival (rwEFS) defined as date from randomization to date of the first of the following events: failure to undergo resection for any reason, progression prior to surgery that precludes resection, recurrence or progression at any time after surgery or death from any cause, and overall survival (OS) defined as time from randomization to death from any cause. The target accrual is 1,100 patients assuming one-sided type I error of 0.03 for OS endpoint and 0.02 for rwEFS endpoint. This sample size will enable the detection of a 3-year rwEFS improvement from 55% in the adjuvant therapy arm to 64% in the perioperative arm with an 84% power. This sample size would detect an HR of 0.73 (improvement in median OS from 8.1 to 11 years in favor of the perioperative arm, 5-year OS from 65% in the adjuvant arm to 73% in the perioperative arm, assuming exponential survival) with 83.6% power. The study has a pragmatic design with minimal data collection, reporting of adverse events that lead to discontinuation of therapy, hospitalization or death only. It allows providers to choose therapy per standard of care (FDA approved or on NCCN), includes patients with ECOG performance status 2, permits use of local laboratory testing and imaging studies and determination of recurrence/progression will be done by local treating physicians with no use of RECIST. Clinical trial information: NCT06632327 .

Abstract An accurate assessment of p53’s functional statuses is critical for cancer genomic medicine. However, there is a significant challenge in identifying tumors with non-mutational p53 inactivation which is not detectable through DNA sequencing. These undetected cases are often misclassified as p53-normal, leading to inaccurate prognosis and downstream association analyses. To address this issue, we built the support vector machine (SVM) models to systematically reassess p53’s functional statuses in TP53 wild-type (TP53WT) tumors from multiple The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) cohorts. Cross-validation demonstrated the good performance of the SVM models with a mean area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC) of 0.9822, precision of 0.9747, and recall of 0.9784. Our study revealed that a significant proportion (87%–99%) of TP53WT tumors actually had compromised p53 function. Additional analyses uncovered that these genetically intact but functionally impaired (termed as predictively reduced function of p53 or TP53WT-pRF) tumors exhibited genomic and pathophysiologic features akin to TP53-mutant tumors: heightened genomic instability and elevated levels of hypoxia. Clinically, patients with TP53WT-pRF tumors experienced significantly shortened overall survival or progression-free survival compared to those with predictively normal function of p53 (TP53WT-pN) tumors, and these patients also displayed increased sensitivity to platinum-based chemotherapy and radiation therapy.

Importance The randomized clinical trial Cancer and Leukemia Group B (CALGB) 140503 showed that for patients with clinically staged T1N0 non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC; ≤2 cm), sublobar resections were associated with similar oncological outcomes to those after lobar resection. The association of the extent of parenchymal resection with recurrence and survival in patients with tumors pathologically upstaged to T2 based on visceral pleural invasion (VPI) is controversial. Objective To determine survival and recurrence rates in patients with small peripheral pT2 NSCLC (≤2 cm) that was treated by either lobar or sublobar resection in CALGB 140503. Design, Participants, and Setting CALGB 140503, a randomized multicenter noninferiority trial, included 697 patients with small peripheral NSCLC that was clinically staged as T1N0. Enrollment was from June 2007 through March 2017 at 83 participating institutions, and after a median follow-up of 7 years, the primary outcome of disease-free survival after sublobar resection was noninferior to that after lobar resection. Intervention Lobar or sublobar resection. Main Outcomes and Measures Survival end points were estimated by the Kaplan-Meier estimator. Hazard ratios and 95% CIs were estimated using stratified Cox proportional hazard models. Results Of 679 participants, 390 (57.4%) were female, and the median (range) age was 67.8 (37.8-89.7) years. Among 697 patients randomized, 566 (81.2%) had pT1 tumors (no VPI) and 113 (16.2%) had pT2 tumors (VPI). Five-year disease-free survival was 65.9% (95% CI, 61.9%-70.2%) in patients with pT1 compared with 53.3% (95% CI, 44.3%-64.1%) in patients with pT2 tumors (stratified log-rank: P = .02). Disease recurrence developed in 27.6% of patients with pT1 (locoregional only: 60 [10.8%]; distant only: 81 [14.6%]) and 41.6% of those with pT2 (locoregional only: 17 [15.0%]; distant only: 27 [23.9%]). Five-year recurrence-free survival was 73.1% (95% CI, 69.2%-77.1%) for pT1 tumors and 58.2% (95% CI, 49.2%-68.8%) for pT2 tumors (stratified log-rank: P = .01). There were no intergroup differences in disease-free or recurrence-free survival based on the extent of parenchymal resection. Conclusions and Relevance The results of this secondary analysis suggest that compared with patients with tumors without VPI, patients who had tumors with VPI had worse disease-free and recurrence-free survival and a higher rate of local and distant disease recurrence. These high rates of recurrence were independent of the extent of parenchymal resection, and these data support the inclusion of these patients in adjuvant therapy trials. Trial Registration ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT0049933

Importance Outcomes for patients with unresectable stage III non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) treated with chemoradiation therapy (CRT) have improved with adjuvant immune checkpoint inhibitors, with a reported 5-year overall survival benefit of approximately 10% for adjuvant durvalumab vs placebo after completion of CRT without progression and with preserved performance status. Starting atezolizumab prior to CRT may allow more patients to benefit from immunotherapy. Objective To evaluate clinical outcomes of patients treated with atezolizumab before and after CRT for unresectable stage III NSCLC. Design, Setting, and Participants This single-cohort, phase II, nonrandomized controlled trial was conducted at 11 US sites. Patients with pathologically confirmed, unresectable stage III NSCLC who were treatment naive and had good performance status were enrolled between January 3, 2018, and July 24, 2019. Data were locked on March 21, 2023. Interventions Patients received four 21-day cycles of atezolizumab, 1200 mg intravenously, with therapy administered on day 1 of each cycle. Patients not experiencing tumor progression continued to CRT (60 Gy to involved fields) concurrent with weekly carboplatin area under the curve of 2 and paclitaxel, 50 mg/m 2 , followed by planned consolidation carboplatin area under the curve of 6 and paclitaxel, 200 mg/m 2 , for two 21-day cycles. Patients not experiencing progression continued atezolizumab, 1200 mg, every 21 days to complete 1 year of therapy. Main Outcomes and Measures The primary end point was the disease control rate at 12 weeks. Secondary end points were progression-free survival, overall survival, overall response rate, safety, and translational science end points. Results A total of 62 patients (median [range] age, 63.9 [38.1-86.5] years; 32 female [51.6%]) were enrolled and received at least 1 dose of atezolizumab. The disease control rate at 12 weeks was 74.2% (80% CI, 65.7%-81.4%). Median progression-free survival was 30.0 months (95% CI, 15.8 to not evaluable), and the median overall survival was not reached. The overall survival rate at 24 months was 73.7% (95% CI, 63.4%-85.7%), and the overall response rate was 66.2%. Seventeen patients (27.4%) experienced grade 3 or higher immune-related adverse events, including 1 with grade 5 pneumonitis and 1 with grade 4 Guillain-Barré syndrome. Thirty patients (48.4%) experienced grade 3 or higher treatment-related adverse events. Conclusions and Relevance These findings suggest that neoadjuvant atezolizumab merits further study based on safety and encouraging outcomes. Trial Registration ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03102242

TPS5642 Background: The landscape in the management of recurrent or persistent endometrial cancer (EC) continues to evolve. Anti-PD-1/PD-L1 immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICI) as monotherapy or when combined with the VEGF-targeted tyrosine kinase inhibitor, lenvatinib, have demonstrated promising response rates in patients (pts) with microsatellite instability-high (MSI-H)/mismatch repair-deficient (dMMR) and MS-stable (MSS)/MMR-proficient (MMRp) EC, respectively. Recent studies have also shown a benefit with adding ICI to standard of care chemotherapy in the frontline setting. Pts with MSI-H/dMMR tumors seem to derive the greatest benefit. Approximately, 30% of recurrent EC pts fall into this category. Pairing ICI with targeted therapies carries the potential to elicit prolonged anti-tumor effects. Atezolizumab (Atezo) is a humanized monoclonal PD-L1 inhibitor that has demonstrated monotherapy antitumor activity in relapsed recurrent EC, and other solid tumors (e.g. NSCLC, HCC) as monotherapy and as part of combinatorial therapy. The AFT-50/EndoMAP study is a phase IB/II non-randomized, multicenter, 2-arm, multi-cohort platform trial designed to evaluate the efficacy and safety of biomarker-driven combination regimens, both with Atezo (AFT-50A) and without Atezo (AFT-50B) with biomarker-defined targeted agents in pts with recurrent or persistent EC. Methods: Eligible pts have recurrent or persistent EC with no more than 2 prior lines of therapy. FoundationOne CDx (F1CDx) NGS assay will be used for genomic tumor profiling. In AFT-50A, pts may be eligible for one of the following doublets: Atezo+talazoparib (tumors with genomic loss of heterozygosity (gLOH ≥16%), Atezo+Trastuzumab emtansine (ERBB2/HER2 mutated or amplified tumors), and Atezo+Tiragolumab (MSI-H and/or TMB-H). The Atezo+bevacizumab (biomarker unmatched) and Atezo+ipatasertib (PIK3CA/PTEN/AKT1-altered tumors) cohorts have completed accrual. Each cohort will enroll ~20 pts with potential adjustment to account for statistical and clinical considerations. AFT-50A pts will receive Atezo in addition to a targeted agent (per study-approved dosing schedule) until progression, unacceptable toxicity, pt withdrawal, death, or study termination. AFT-50B pts will be eligible for inavolisib (PIK3CAm/PTEN and AKT1wt-altered tumors) + letrozole or giredestrant + abemaciclib (RB1wt, estrogen receptor positive tumors). The primary endpoint for AFT-50A is confirmed overall response rate (ORR) for each arm, and for AFT-50B is 6-month progression free survival. Secondary endpoints include disease control rate, duration of response, OS, safety and tolerability. As a platform study, additional arms may be added, as supported by evolving understanding of EC and molecular targets. EndoMAP is actively enrolling at 20 sites in the US with a target of 25 sites nationwide. Clinical trial information: NCT04486352 .