Propranolol monotherapy in angiosarcoma - A window-of-opportunity study (PropAngio).

BACKGROUND: Angiosarcoma is a rare and aggressive cancer of the endothelial cells. Propranolol, a non-selective ß-blocker, was able to initiate apoptosis in angiosarcoma cell lines and its anti-tumor activity has been described in several case reports. The aim of this trial was to prospectively evaluate the anti-tumor activity of propranolol monotherapy in patients with angiosarcoma before proceeding to standard of care treatment. METHODS: Propranolol was dosed 80 mg to 240 mg/day for 3 to 6 weeks according to a dose titration schedule. The primary endpoint was clinical response (response according to RECIST 1.1 or stable disease with improvement of cutaneous lesions) in at least three patients. Exploratory objectives included histologic response (>30% decrease in Ki-67), FDG PET response, and ß-receptor expression levels. RESULTS: Fourteen patients were enrolled. The median duration of treatment was 26 days (range 21-42 days). The median highest propranolol dose was 160 mg/day (range 80 - 240 mg). Two patients showed clinical response (14%, 95% CI 3-100%). One of these patients showed a partial metabolic response on PET-CT. None of the tumors showed histologic response. The most common adverse event was grade 1/2 bradycardia (86%). There were no grade ≥ 3 adverse events. ADRB2 was overexpressed in 16 out of 18 tumors, in both responders and non-responders. None of the tumors showed ADRB1 overexpression. CONCLUSIONS: This window-of-opportunity trial did not show clinical efficacy of propranolol monotherapy. However, two out of 14 patients did show clinical benefit. ADRB1/2 expression did not correlate with clinical response.

Detection and localization of early- and late-stage cancers using platelet RNA.

Cancer patients benefit from early tumor detection since treatment outcomes are more favorable for less advanced cancers. Platelets are involved in cancer progression and are considered a promising biosource for cancer detection, as they alter their RNA content upon local and systemic cues. We show that tumor-educated platelet (TEP) RNA-based blood tests enable the detection of 18 cancer types. With 99% specificity in asymptomatic controls, thromboSeq correctly detected the presence of cancer in two-thirds of 1,096 blood samples from stage I-IV cancer patients and in half of 352 stage I-III tumors. Symptomatic controls, including inflammatory and cardiovascular diseases, and benign tumors had increased false-positive test results with an average specificity of 78%. Moreover, thromboSeq determined the tumor site of origin in five different tumor types correctly in over 80% of the cancer patients. These results highlight the potential properties of TEP-derived RNA panels to supplement current approaches for blood-based cancer screening.

Phase I/IIa Trial of BMS-986148, an Anti-mesothelin Antibody-drug Conjugate, Alone or in Combination with Nivolumab in Patients with Advanced Solid Tumors.

PURPOSE: To assess the safety and tolerability of BMS-986148, a mesothelin-directed antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) ± nivolumab, in patients with selected tumors. PATIENTS AND METHODS: In an international phase I/IIa study [NCT02341625 (CA008-002)], patients received BMS-986148 monotherapy (0.1-1.6 mg/kg intravenously (i.v.) every 3 weeks or 0.4 or 0.6 mg/kg i.v. once weekly; n = 96) or BMS-986148 0.8 mg/kg + nivolumab 360 mg i.v. every 3 weeks (n = 30). The primary endpoint was safety and tolerability. RESULTS: In CA008-002, the most common (≥ 10%) treatment-related adverse events (TRAEs) included increased aspartate aminotransferase, alanine aminotransferase, and alkaline phosphatase. Grade 3/4 TRAEs occurred in 42 patients (49%) receiving BMS-986148 every 3 weeks monotherapy, three (25%) receiving BMS-986148 once-weekly monotherapy, and 10 (33%) receiving BMS-986148 + nivolumab every 3 weeks. Overall, 17 of 126 patients (13%) discontinued because of a TRAE. The MTD of BMS-986148 was 1.2 mg/kg i.v. every 3 weeks. The safety profile of BMS-986148 + nivolumab was similar to that of BMS-986148 monotherapy (0.8 mg/kg). Active ADC exposures increased in a dose-proportional manner with both dosing regimens (every 3 weeks and once weekly). Preliminary clinical activity was observed with BMS-986148 ± nivolumab. No association between mesothelin expression and response was detected. CONCLUSIONS: BMS-986148 ± nivolumab demonstrated a clinically manageable safety profile and preliminary evidence of clinical activity, supporting additional studies combining directed cytotoxic therapies with checkpoint inhibitors as potential multimodal therapeutic strategies in patients with advanced solid tumors.

A cost analysis study of the implementation of fixed-dosing of monoclonal antibodies in the Netherlands Cancer Institute.

Background There is a strong rationale for fixed-dosing of monoclonal antibodies in oncology. Although fixed-dosing of recently introduced monoclonal antibodies is well accepted, the rationale is also applicable for other monoclonal antibodies that already have been used for years, but are still body-size-based dosed in many hospitals. In the Netherlands Cancer Institute, Antoni van Leeuwenhoek (NKI-AVL), fixed-dosing has been implemented now for all monoclonal antibodies and, therefore, this site offers an ideal opportunity for a cost analysis study. Objective To investigate the financial impact of switching to fixed-dosing in the NKI-AVL. Setting The NKI-AVL. Method Information on the preparations of monoclonal antibodies was collected from August 2017 to February 2020. We compared the number of vials needed during preparation for fixed-dosing and body-size -based dosing strategies. The economic impact was calculated for 2 scenarios: scenario 1 assumed clustering of all preparations per day and scenario 2 assumed no clustering of preparations. Main outcome measure Number of saved vials and the correlating savings in health care costs. Results The implementation of fixed-dosing resulted in a substantial reduction in vials used for almost all monoclonal antibodies. The economic savings were calculated to be €0,8 and €3,1 million per year for scenario 1 and 2, respectively. Conclusion Fixed-dosing resulted in substantial savings in health care costs.

OX40 Agonist BMS-986178 Alone or in Combination With Nivolumab and/or Ipilimumab in Patients With Advanced Solid Tumors.

PURPOSE: This phase I/IIa study (NCT02737475) evaluated the safety and activity of BMS-986178, a fully human OX40 agonist IgG1 mAb, ± nivolumab and/or ipilimumab in patients with advanced solid tumors. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Patients (with non-small cell lung, renal cell, bladder, other advanced cancers) received BMS-986178 (20-320 mg) ± nivolumab (240-480 mg) and/or ipilimumab (1-3 mg/kg). The primary endpoint was safety. Additional endpoints included immunogenicity, pharmacodynamics, pharmacokinetics, and antitumor activity per RECIST version 1.1. RESULTS: Twenty patients received BMS-986178 monotherapy, and 145 received combination therapy in various regimens (including two patients receiving nivolumab monotherapy). With a follow-up of 1.1 to 103.6 weeks, the most common (≥5%) treatment-related adverse events (TRAEs) included fatigue, pruritus, rash, pyrexia, diarrhea, and infusion-related reactions. Overall, grade 3-4 TRAEs occurred in one of 20 patients (5%) receiving BMS-986178 monotherapy, six of 79 (8%) receiving BMS-986178 plus nivolumab, zero of two receiving nivolumab monotherapy, six of 41 (15%) receiving BMS-986178 plus ipilimumab, and three of 23 (13%) receiving BMS-986178 plus nivolumab plus ipilimumab. No deaths occurred. No dose-limiting toxicities were observed with monotherapy, and the MTD was not reached in either the monotherapy or the combination escalation cohorts. No objective responses were seen with BMS-986178 alone; objective response rates ranged from 0% to 13% across combination therapy cohorts. CONCLUSIONS: In this study, BMS-986178 ± nivolumab and/or ipilimumab appeared to have a manageable safety profile, but no clear efficacy signal was observed above that expected for nivolumab and/or ipilimumab.

PropAngio study protocol: a neoadjuvant trial on the efficacy of propranolol monotherapy in cutaneous angiosarcoma-a proof of principle study.

INTRODUCTION: Angiosarcoma is a rare and aggressive malignancy with a high metastatic potential and recurrence rate. Despite optimal treatment with surgery, with or without radiation, the prognosis remains poor and, therefore, new treatment strategies are warranted. Recently, propranolol has effectively been repurposed for the treatment of infantile haemangioma. Propranolol is a ß3-sparing antagonist of the ß-adrenergic receptor. In infantile haemangioma, the ß1, ß2 and ß3 receptors are highly expressed. Angiosarcoma has several similarities with haemangioma, including its high ß-adrenergic receptor expression and the supposedly important role of vascular endothelial growth factor in malignant growth. As a result, propranolol has been administered small scale in individual angiosarcoma cases with promising results. The precise effect of propranolol, however, is not yet established. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: The goal of this neoadjuvant window of opportunity study is to prospectively evaluate the activity of propranolol monotherapy in patients with cutaneous angiosarcoma. The neoadjuvant setting provides a good opportunity to rapidly evaluate both the clinical response and histological response, without a significant delay in standard anticancer treatment. Fourteen patients with primary, recurrent or metastatic cutaneous angiosarcoma will be included. Propranolol will be administered orally in an escalating dose during 3-6 weeks, before the initiation of standard treatment. The primary endpoint is clinical response according to Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumours, as measured on consecutive coloured photographs or CT/MRI. The histological response will be determined as secondary endpoint, comparing the difference in proliferation index before and after propranolol by measuring the change in immunohistochemistry staining of Ki-67. The study will be considered positive when at least three patients have a response to propranolol. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: Ethical approval was obtained from the Medical Ethical Committee of the Netherlands Cancer Institute. Independent of the outcome, results of this study will be shared and submitted for publication in an international peer-reviewed journal. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER: NL8118; registry through the Netherlands Trial Register.

Neoadjuvant Systemic Treatment of Primary Angiosarcoma.

Angiosarcoma is an extremely rare and aggressive malignancy. Standard of care of localized tumors includes surgery ± radiation. Despite this multimodal treatment, >50% of the angiosarcoma patients develop local or distant recurrent disease. The role of neoadjuvant systemic therapy is still controversial and we therefore performed a systematic review of the literature to define the role of neoadjuvant systemic therapy based on available evidence. We focused on the effects of neoadjuvant systemic therapy on: 1. The success of surgical resection and 2. the long-term survival. All articles published before October 2019 on Ovid Medline, Ovid Embase, Cochrane library and Scopus were evaluated. Eighteen case reports and six retrospective cohort studies were included. There were no randomized controlled trials. This literature showed a beneficial role of neoadjuvant chemotherapy on downsizing of the tumor resulting in an improvement of the resection margins, especially in patients with cardiac or cutaneous angiosarcoma. However, no definitive conclusions on survival can be drawn based on the available literature lacking any prospective randomized studies in this setting. We advise that neoadjuvant chemotherapy should be considered, since this could lead to less mutilating resections and a higher rate of free resection margins. An international angiosarcoma registry could help to develop guidelines for this rare disease.

RNA-Sequencing of Tumor-Educated Platelets, a Novel Biomarker for Blood-Based Sarcoma Diagnostics.

Sarcoma is a heterogeneous group of rare malignancies arising from mesenchymal tissues. Recurrence rates are high and methods for early detection by blood-based biomarkers do not exist. Hence, development of blood-based liquid biopsies as disease recurrence monitoring biomarkers would be an important step forward. Recently, it has been shown that tumor-educated platelets (TEPs) harbor specific spliced ribonucleic acid(RNA)-profiles. These RNA-repertoires are potentially applicable for cancer diagnostics. We aim to evaluate the potential of TEPs for blood-based diagnostics of sarcoma patients. Fifty-seven sarcoma patients (active disease), 38 former sarcoma patients (cancer free for ≥3 years) and 65 healthy donors were included. RNA was isolated from platelets and sequenced. Quantified read counts were processed with self-learning particle-swarm optimization-enhanced thromboSeq analysis and subjected to analysis of variance (ANOVA) statistics. Highly correlating spliced platelet messenger RNAs (mRNAs) of sarcoma patients were compared to controls (former sarcoma + healthy donors) to identify a quantitative sarcoma-specific signature measure, the TEP-score. ANOVA analysis identified distinctive platelet RNA expression patterns of 2647 genes (false discovery rate <0.05) in sarcoma patients as compared to controls. The self-learning algorithm reached a diagnostic accuracy of 87% (validation set only; n = 53 samples, area under the curve (AUC): 0.93, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.86-1). Our data indicates that TEP RNA-based liquid biopsies may enable for sarcoma diagnostics.

Follow up survey for implementation of fixed-dosing of monoclonal antibodies.

Background Similar to the earlier anti-cancer therapies, monoclonal antibodies were introduced in bodysize-based schedules, despite the fact that body size only modestly effects the distribution, elimination and efficacy of monoclonal antibodies. Fixed-dosing of nivolumab and pembrolizumab has recently been approved by the European Medicines Agency. Objective To investigate the implementation of fixed-dosing of nivolumab, pembrolizumab and other monoclonal antibodies in the treatment of cancer. Method An online questionnaire was distributed among Dutch hospitals in January 2019. Results The majority of the hospitals (> 60%) responded, with a good representation of the characteristics of the hospitals in the Netherlands. Most hospitals which prescribe nivolumab and/or pembrolizumab have introduced fixed-dose-based schedules. However, the dosing of the other monoclonal antibodies was still based on body size. Conclusion Fixed-dosebased schedules of nivolumab and pembrolizumab have been rapidly implemented in most Dutch hospitals after approval of the European Medicines Agency. Despite emerging evidence which supports fixed-dose-based schedules for almost all the other monoclonal antibodies, its implementation stays behind. To increase the acceptance of fixed-dose-based schedules of monoclonal antibodies in the guidelines, additional studies may be needed, which focus on evaluating exposure, activity and cost effectiveness with the attempt to uncover the exact savings in costs for patient care.

Safety, Tolerability, and Potential Clinical Activity of a Glucocorticoid-Induced TNF Receptor-Related Protein Agonist Alone or in Combination With Nivolumab for Patients With Advanced Solid Tumors: A Phase 1/2a Dose-Escalation and Cohort-Expansion Clinical Trial.

IMPORTANCE: Multiple immunostimulatory agonist antibodies have been clinically tested in solid tumors to evaluate the role of targeting glucocorticoid-induced tumor necrosis factor (TNF) receptor-related protein in anticancer treatments. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the safety and activity of the fully human glucocorticoid-induced TNF receptor-related protein agonist IgG1 monoclonal antibody BMS-986156 with or without nivolumab in patients with advanced solid tumors. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: This global, open-label, phase 1/2a study of BMS-986156 with or without nivolumab enrolled 292 patients 18 years or older with advanced solid tumors and an Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status of 1 or less. Prior checkpoint inhibitor therapy was allowed. Monotherapy and combination dose-escalation cohorts ran concurrently to guide expansion doses beginning October 16, 2015; the study is ongoing. INTERVENTIONS: The protein agonist BMS-986156 was administered intravenously at a dose of 10, 30, 100, 240, or 800 mg every 2 weeks as monotherapy, and in the combination group 30, 100, 240, or 800 mg plus 240 mg of nivolumab every 2 weeks; same-dose cohorts were pooled for analysis. One cohort also received 480 mg of BMS-986156 plus 480 mg of nivolumab every 4 weeks. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES: The primary end points were safety, tolerability, and dose-limiting toxic effects. Additional end points included antitumor activity per Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors, version 1.1, and exploratory biomarker analyses. RESULTS: With a follow-up range of 1.4 to 101.7 weeks (follow-up ongoing), 34 patients (16 women and 18 men; median age, 56.6 years [range, 28-75 years]) received monotherapy (4 patients completed initial treatment), and 258 patients (140 women and 118 men; median age, 60 years [range, 21-87 years]) received combination therapy (65 patients completed initial treatment). No grade 3 to 5 treatment-related adverse events occurred with BMS-986156 monotherapy; grade 3 to 4 treatment-related adverse events occurred in 24 patients (9.3%) receiving BMS-986156 plus nivolumab, with no grade 5 treatment-related adverse events. One dose-limiting toxic effect (grade 4 elevated creatine phosphokinase levels) occurred in a patient receiving 800 mg of BMS-986156 plus 240 mg of nivolumab every 2 weeks; BMS-986156 with or without nivolumab exhibited linear pharmacokinetics with dose-related increase after a single dose. Peripheral T-cell and natural killer-cell proliferation increased after administration of BMS-986156 with or without nivolumab. No consistent and significant modulation of intratumoral CD8+ T cells and FoxP3+ regulatory T cells was observed. No responses were seen with BMS-986156 alone; objective response rates ranged from 0% to 11.1% (1 of 9) across combination therapy cohorts, with a few responses observed in patients previously treated with anti-programmed death receptor (ligand) 1 therapy. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: Based on this cohort, BMS-986156 appears to have had a manageable safety profile, and BMS-986156 plus nivolumab demonstrated safety and efficacy comparable to historical data reported for nivolumab monotherapy. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT02598960.

A Human Cell Line Model for Interferon-α Driven Dendritic Cell Differentiation.

The CD34+ MUTZ-3 acute myeloid leukemia cell line has been used as a dendritic cell (DC) differentiation model. This cell line can be cultured into Langerhans cell (LC) or interstitial DC-like cells using the same cytokine cocktails used for the differentiation of their primary counterparts. Currently, there is an increasing interest in the study and clinical application of DC generated in the presence of IFNα, as these IFNα-DC produce high levels of inflammatory cytokines and have been suggested to be more potent in their ability to cross-present protein antigens, as compared to the more commonly used IL-4-DC. Here, we report on the generation of IFNα-induced MUTZ-DC. We show that IFNα MUTZ-DC morphologically and phenotypically display characteristic DC features and are functionally equivalent to "classic" IL-4 MUTZ-DC. IFNα MUTZ-DC ingest exogenous antigens and can subsequently cross-present HLA class-I restricted epitopes to specific CD8+ T cells. Importantly, mature IFNα MUTZ-DC express CCR7, migrate in response to CCL21, and are capable of priming naïve antigen-specific CD8+ T cells. In conclusion, we show that the MUTZ-3 cell line offers a viable and sustainable model system to study IFNα driven DC development and functionality.