SOHO 2026 | Where does the treatment landscape for managing frontline CML currently stand?
Jorge Cortes, MD, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL, comments on the current treatment landscape for frontline chronic myeloid leukemia (CML), noting that while existing tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) have a long history of effective use, emerging data on asciminib show promising efficacy. Dr Cortes highlights that the maturation of data is needed to determine if deeper molecular responses translate into more treatment-free remission patients. This interview took place at the 14th Annual Meeting of the Society of Hematologic Oncology (SOHO 2026) in Houston, TX.
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Transcript
I think it is realistic to say that we’re still split on what’s the optimal treatment for CML because there is very good data that we have for many years for the existing TKIs and they’re very good. The new data with asciminib is maturing and it’s showing continued improvement, deeper responses. And so there’s different ways of looking at this...
I think it is realistic to say that we’re still split on what’s the optimal treatment for CML because there is very good data that we have for many years for the existing TKIs and they’re very good. The new data with asciminib is maturing and it’s showing continued improvement, deeper responses. And so there’s different ways of looking at this. And part of that is, what are you focusing on? Are you focusing on survival? And yeah, no, we’re not improving survival anymore. Are you looking for deep molecular responses? And yes, we are seeing more deep molecular responses. Now, what we don’t have yet is are they translating into more treatment-free remission patients? Obviously, that’s why we want deep molecular responses. That needs more maturation of the data. But I think that that’s causing that split, it’s a good split because we’re going, you know, through good drugs and good data, but I think we still have to get more maturation of the data. Now, I think at least in my view, we have enough to consider that asciminib provides a benefit to the patients with the data that we have already. But there’s no question, still some elements that need to be answered with further follow-up, not only for the pivotal trial, but some of the additional trials that are being developed.
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