The current management and biomarkers of immunotherapy in advanced gastric cancer

Xiaojing Chang, Xiaohui Ge, Yufeng Zhang, Xiaoying Xue, Xiaojing Chang, Xiaohui Ge, Yufeng Zhang, Xiaoying Xue

Abstract

Background: Gastric carcinoma (GC) is the fourth most common cause of cancer-related death worldwide. Most patients are diagnosed at later stage, because of few treatment options, the prognosis is poor. In recent years, however, Immune checkpoint inhibitors(ICIs), such as anti- programmed death-1 (PD-1), anti-PD-L1, and anti-cytotoxic T lymphocyte antigen 4, have emerged as promising therapeutic agents in GC. Here, we summary the current treatment and advances of immune checkpoint inhibitors in the advanced stage of GC.

Methods: WANFANG MED ONLINE, CNKI, NCBI PUBMED and clinicaltrials.gov were used to search literature spanning from 2000 to 2021, and all literatures about "advanced gastric or gastro-oesophageal junction cancer, Immune checkpoint inhibitors, PD-1, PD-L1, Cytotoxic T lymphocyte antigen 4, immune therapy" with detailed data were included.

Results: Nivolumab and pembrolizumab have been recommended for the third line or subsequent therapy in advanced GC. Nivolumab plus chemotherapy has been recommended for the first line treatment in advanced GC in China. Many other ICIs have been demonstrating encouraging efficacy. PD-L1, MSI-H, Epstein Barr virus, and tumor mutational burden (TMB) status maybe potential biomarkers for response to clinical outcomes for ICIs in GC.

Conclusion: ICIs have shown encouraging treatment efficacy and manageable safety profile in GC. Some biomarkers including PD-L1, MSI-H, EBV, and TMB status could evaluate the efficacy of ICIs in GC.

Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT02915432 NCT04278222 NCT03662659 NCT02625610 NCT02678182 NCT01585987 NCT04508140 NCT03221426 NCT03488667 NCT03006705 NCT04592913 NCT03448835 NCT04661150 NCT03399071 NCT03421288 NCT03979131.

Conflict of interest statement

The authors have no conflicts of interest to disclose.

Copyright © 2022 the Author(s). Published by Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
the potential biomarkers for ICIs in advanecd GC.

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Source: PubMed

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