Almost a third of patients with aggressive lymphoma remained cancer free 10 years after treatment with CAR T-cell therapy.The long-term data indicate that CD19-directed CAR T-cell therapy may cure some patients with relapsed/refractory lymphoma.Emerging technologies could substantially improve treatment outcomes with CAR T-cell therapy.
Ten years after receiving a single dose of CD19-targeted CAR T-cell therapy, almost a third of patients with aggressive lymphomas and no treatment options remained lymphoma free, updated results from a landmark trial showed.
Overall, 12 of 38 patients remained lymphoma-free at 10 years, half with heavily pretreated large B-cell lymphoma (LBCL) and half with relapsed/refractory follicular lymphoma. No relapses occurred after 5.4 years of follow-up, and no patient with follicular lymphoma relapsed after 2.7 years. The 10-year overall survival was 17% among 24 patients with LBCL and 50% for the 14 with follicular lymphoma.
The results show that CD19-directed CAR T-cell therapy not only can achieve long-term remissions but may possibly cure some patients, reported Marco Ruella, MD, of Penn Medicine in Philadelphia, and colleagues in the New England Journal of Medicine.
