First-line avelumab for patients with PD-L1-positive metastatic or locally advanced urothelial cancer who are unfit for cisplatin.

BACKGROUND: Cisplatin-based chemotherapy is the most recommended treatment for metastatic urothelial cancer (mUC). However, about 50% of patients are considered to be cisplatin ineligible. Anti-programmed cell death protein 1/programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) therapies have, nevertheless, increased the options available to clinicians and are especially valuable for treating these patients. This study therefore tested the activity and safety of avelumab as first-line therapy for mUC. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Patients with mUC who were ineligible for cisplatin-based chemotherapy were screened centrally for PD-L1 expression and only those with a tumour proportion score ≥ 5% were enrolled in the trial. The primary endpoint was 1-year overall survival (OS), and the secondary endpoints were median OS, median progression-free survival, overall response rate, duration of the response, safety and tolerability. All the survival rates were estimated with the Kaplan-Meier product-limit methodology and compared across groups using the log-rank test. RESULTS: A total of 198 patients were screened, with 71 (35.9%) whose PD-L1 expression was ≥5% enrolled in the study. The median age was 75 years, bladder cancer was the primary tumour in 73.2% of cases and 25.3% had liver metastases. The main reasons for the cisplatin ineligibility were a low rate of creatinine clearance (<60 ml/min), present in 70.4% of patients, and an Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status of 2, which affected 31%. The median OS was 10.0 months (95% confidence interval 5.5-14.5 months) and 43% of patients were alive at 1 year. A complete response was achieved in 8.5% of cases, and 15.5% had a partial response. Adverse any-grade and high-grade events occurred in 49.3% and 8.5% of patients, respectively. A grade 3 infusion reaction was the only high-grade treatment-related adverse event. No treatment-related deaths were reported. CONCLUSIONS: This ARIES trial confirmed the activity and safety of avelumab for treating mUC, adding a new therapy option to the armamentarium of checkpoint inhibitors already approved for platinum-ineligible, locally advanced/mUC.

Immune-inflammatory biomarkers as prognostic factors for immunotherapy in pretreated advanced urinary tract cancer patients: an analysis of the Italian SAUL cohort.

BACKGROUND: Reliable and affordable prognostic and predictive biomarkers for urothelial carcinoma treated with immunotherapy may allow patients' outcome stratification and drive therapeutic options. The SAUL trial investigated the safety and efficacy of atezolizumab in a real-world setting on 1004 patients with locally advanced or metastatic urothelial carcinoma who progressed to one to three prior systemic therapies. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Using the SAUL Italian cohort of 267 patients, we investigated the prognostic role of neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) and systemic immune-inflammation index (SII) and the best performing one of these in combination with programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) with or without lactate dehydrogenase (LDH). Previously reported cut-offs (NLR >3 and NLR >5; SII >1375) in addition to study-defined ones derived from receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis were used. RESULTS: The cut-off values for NLR and SII by the ROC analysis were 3.65 (sensitivity 60.4; specificity 63.0) and 884 (sensitivity 64.4; specificity 67.5), respectively. The median overall survival (OS) was 14.7 months for NLR <3.65 [95% confidence interval (CI) 9.9-not reached (NR)] versus 6.0 months for NLR ≥3.65 (95% CI 3.9-9.4); 14.7 months for SII <884 (95% CI 10.6-NR) versus 6.0 months for SII ≥884 (95% CI 3.7-8.6). The combination of SII, PD-L1, and LDH stratified OS better than SII plus PD-L1 through better identification of patients with intermediate prognosis (77% versus 48%, respectively). Multivariate analyses confirmed significant correlations with OS and progression-free survival for both the SII + PD-L1 + LDH and SII + PD-L1 combinations. CONCLUSION: The combination of immune-inflammatory biomarkers based on SII, PD-L1, with or without LDH is a potentially useful and easy-to-assess prognostic tool deserving validation to identify patients who may benefit from immunotherapy alone or alternative therapies.

Pathological and molecular features of adrenocortical carcinoma: an update.

The pathological diagnosis of adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC), which is based on gross and microscopic criteria, is subjective. None of the features are absolutely indicative of malignancy, although their combination in a scoring system may correctly identify ACC. The Weiss system, which is currently the most popular, combines nine morphological parameters, of which three are structural ("dark" cytoplasm, diffuse architecture, necrosis), three are cytological (atypia, mitotic count, atypical mitotic figures) and three are related to invasion (of sinusoids, veins and tumour capsule). Although there are strictly defined criteria for each feature, some are straightforward and objective, while others are potentially more problematic (diffuse architecture, necrosis, sinusoidal, venous and capsular invasions). The classification of oncocytic and paediatric adrenocortical tumours is even more challenging, as not all of the above morphological parameters are predictors of malignancy in these tumour types. As an alternative to the morphological approach, a wide array of chromosomal, genetic, molecular and immunohistochemical markers have been tested in ACC to identify reliable diagnostic and prognostic factors. Genetic and epigenetic alterations of p53, IGF-2 and molecules involved in cancer cell invasive properties seem the most promising. These molecular markers may not only play a role in the biology of these tumours and have prognostic implications, but may also be used as potential targets for treatment. However, these markers are not sufficiently sensitive and specific to replace conventional morphological criteria.