Combination Therapies Open New Doors in Renal Cell Carcinoma Studies

Combination therapies for the treatment of patients with renal cell carcinoma continue to show more promise with the combination of Opdivo (nivolumab) plus Cabometyx (cabozantinib) opening the door for more treatments, according to Dr. Bradley McGregor.

McGregor, clinical director of the Lank Center for Genitourinary Oncology at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, presented data on the CheckMate 9ER trial comparing Opdivo plus Cabometyx versus Sutent (sunitinib). He also had the chance to sit down with OncLive®, a sister publication to CURE®, and discuss the significance of this trial and what it means for future trials looking at combination therapies for the treatment of patients with renal cell carcinoma.

TRANSCRIPTION

I think that this does show an improvement in, hopefully, not only progression-free survival but also overall survival, that this will be another option for those patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma. And I think that's what COSMI-313 is doing, which is looking at not adding cab just in nivolumab but really the first trial in renal cell carcinoma with a modern therapeutic comparator.

We're looking at the combination of nivolumab and ipilimumab with or without cabozantinib, really trying to what always seems to be that durability, those complete responses, with nivolumab and ipilimumab and seeing if we can overcome that progressive disease as best, we can with that addition of the tyrosine kinase inhibitor.