EBMT-EHA CAR-T 2019 | CAR T-cell therapy to revolutionize multiple myeloma?
Mohamad Mohty, MD, PhD Saint-Antoine Hospital, Paris, France, discusses the use of CAR T-cell therapy for multiple myeloma and the recent advances in this area such as the introduction of 2nd generation proteasome inhibitors, IMiDs and monoclonal antibodies. Speaking at the 1st European CAR T-Cell Meeting, held in Paris, France, co-organized by the European Society for Blood & Marrow Transplantation (EBMT) and the European Hematology Association (EHA), Prof. Mohty goes on to explains how these advances have significantly improved the clinical outcomes for patients wtih multiple myeloma and that CAR T-cell therapy has shown to be extremely promising with much more research in the pipeline.
Transcript (edited for clarity)
Multiple myeloma is another very exciting indication for the use of CAR T-cells. Of course, we’ve seen a lot of advances in multiple myeloma over the last few years with the introduction of second generation proteasome inhibitors, second or third generation IMiDs the monoclonal antibodies, all of this is allowing to significantly increase the survival of multiple myeloma patient. More recently, CAR T-cells, especially CAR T-cells directed against BCMA, have made wonderful entry into the scene, I would say, with several trials ongoing in North America, in China, in Europe, showing that even multiple myeloma patients who failed more than five, six, or seven lines of therapy are able to respond to these anti-BCMA CAR T-cells. In one of the trials, the BB2121, you can achieve almost 12 months of PFS, and that can go up to 18 months in those who are able to achieve negative MRD. So it’s really a very promising area and bringing a lot of hope for the patient. Of course, the landscape will move also very quickly because we have seen recently, also, trials looking into the role of CAR T-cells as consolidation front line after autotransplant in high risk multiple myeloma patients. There are also several perspective to allow the persistence of these CAR T-cells over the long-term, combination with IMIDs, with checkpoint inhibitors, maybe using other agents that can allow you to up-regulate the antigen like BCMA. So it’s really a fascinating area of research and I believe that will represent another important new pillar for the treatment of multiple myeloma.
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