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ASCO 2026 | Safety and efficacy of azer-cel in patients with R/R NHL & CLL
Supriya Gupta, MD, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, shares insights into the safety and efficacy of azercabtagene zapreleucel (azer-cel), an allogeneic, off-the-shelf, CD19-directed CAR T-cell therapy, in patients with relapsed/refractory (R/R) non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) and chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). 79% of patients responded to the therapy, with cytokine release syndrome (CRS) and immune effector cell-associated neurotoxicity syndrome (ICANS) occurring in 84% and 40% of patients, respectively. This interview took place during the 2026 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Meeting in Chicago, IL.
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Transcript
So azercabtagene zapreleucel, or azer-cel, is a CD19-directed, off-the-shelf, allogeneic CAR-T product. We presented the results of azer-cel in patients with relapsed or refractory non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and CLL not previously exposed to CAR-T therapy yesterday at the heme malignancy rapid oral abstract session. Azer-cel has not been previously studied in CAR-T naive patients...
So azercabtagene zapreleucel, or azer-cel, is a CD19-directed, off-the-shelf, allogeneic CAR-T product. We presented the results of azer-cel in patients with relapsed or refractory non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and CLL not previously exposed to CAR-T therapy yesterday at the heme malignancy rapid oral abstract session. Azer-cel has not been previously studied in CAR-T naive patients. We looked at 25 CAR-T naive patients with various different histologies including large B cell lymphoma, follicular lymphoma, marginal zone lymphoma, primary CNS lymphoma, Waldenström macroglobulinemia, and CLL. And what we found is that 79% of patients achieved a response to this therapy. Specifically, CLL, follicular lymphoma, and Waldenström macroglobulinemia had 100% overall response rates, and marginal zone lymphoma had an 83% overall response rate with a 67% CR rate. We noted that the cytokine release syndrome occurred in 84% of patients, and ICANS occurred in about 40% of patients. All the CRS events were grade one or grade two with no grade three or grade four events. With ICANS, they tended to cluster in diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, and no patients with CLL had any ICANS, which speaks regarding the safety of this particular product. We did see some expected infections and cytopenias post lymphodepletion, which were all manageable with supportive care.
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