Great idea: time for Elacestrant thread Tuesday! 🧵
But first a reminder: access to paywalled papers from @Annals_Oncology, @ESMO_Open & multiple other affiliated journals is free for @myESMO members, and I could not recommend more to become a member! esmo.org/membership 1/
Endocrine treatment is among the most effective treatment strategies we have for breast cancer. 50 years ago, the approval of the SERD tamoxifen really revolutionized the field, & we still use the drug today.
Yet, no novel ET had been approved for the last 20 years. Until now 2/
Multiple oral SERDs (selective estrogen receptor degraders) are being developed for patients with HR+ MBC. The first to achieve positive phase 3 results was elacestrant, tested in the #EMERALD trial vs. SoC ET (fulvestrant or AI). Primary endpoint -> PFS overall & in ESR1-mut
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EMERALD enrolled 478 pts with HR+ MBC, mostly in 2nd/3rd line, all of which had received CDK4/6i, most with visceral disease and about half with ESR1-mutant disease.
Nearly all patients were AI-refractory, about 30% received prior fulvestrant and 20% prior chemotherapy
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Primary results were published on @JCO_ASCO: elacestrant significantly improved PFS vs SoC ET & was well tolerated.
However, the absolute PFS benefit was small, and many pts progressed at the first scan in both arms
Data at #SABCS22 showed that a major PFS improvement with elacestrant was seen among ESR1m tumors. The benefit further increased if there was a prolonged benefit from prior CDK4/6i
Based on these data, elacestrant was approved by the @FDAOncology on Jan 27 for ESR1m HR+ MBC
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Importantly, this is not the only novel drug approved in this space. In 2019, alpelisib was approved for treating patients w/ PIK3CA mutant HR+ MBC.
After progression to 1L, it is thus standard to look for PIK3CA muts to select patients for alpelisib
T-DXd has shown remarkable activity for treating HER2-positive and HER2-low breast cancers.
However, it may soon expand its reach, and become a treatment option even for HER2-0 tumors.
Here’s the 10 reasons why:
1. Because it works!
The only study that tested T-DXd for treating HER2-0 metastatic breast cancer (the phase 2 DAISY trial) demonstrated a response rate of 30% and a duration of response of 6.8 months. Not bad for being “zero”.
2. Because activity of T-DXd in HER2-0 has been also observed in other tumor types.
In DESTINY-Lung01 (T-DXd for HER2-mutant NSCLC), several responses were observed in patients w/ HER2-0 tumors, including the only complete response observed in the trial.
In ten days, the presentation of DB-04 may redefine the way we classify and treat breast cancer.
Here’s ten HER2-low facts you need to know before attending the ASCO Plenary Session:
1/10 About half of all BCs have HER2-low expression, defined as HER2 IHC 1+ or 2+/ISH-.
The rate of HER2-low tumors depends however on the expression of ER:
- TNBC: 40% HER2-low
- Moderate ER-exp: 45-55% are HER2-low
- Highly ER-exp: >60% are HER2-low
2/10 HER2-low expression is not associated with major biologic differences (vs. HER2-0). Most HR+ breast tumors are luminal and most TNBCs are basal-like at PAM50, regardless of HER2-low expression
A significant fraction of patients with HER2+ MBC achieve long lasting responses to HER2-blockade, with no evidence of disease for many years after Tx start
Are these patients cured? Can we increase this fraction?
Several aspects are associated w/ a long-lasting response to HER2-blockade
Important clinical features are de-novo presentation, low burden of dz & achievement of CR. Highly HER2+, immune inflamed tumors w/ no detrimental gene muts are more likely to achieve long responses
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Recently emerging drugs and tools may further expand the rate of long-term responders
T-DXd, achieved 16% CR in DB03, and is currently being tested in 1L (DB09). Integration with IO, advancements in ablative treatments & ctDNA assessment also promise to help in this sense