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COSTEM 2021 | Future directions for the management of cGvHD

Hildegard Greinix, MD, Medical University of Graz, Graz, Austria, comments on recently approved drugs for the treatment of chronic graft-versus-host disease (cGvHD) and discusses novel therapeutic strategies for this condition. The ROCK2 inhibitor belumosudil was approved by the FDA earlier this year for the treatment of cGvHD. Whilst ibrutinib is also approved in the US for the treatment of steroid-refractory cGvHD (SR-cGvHD), Prof. Greinix reports that a recent study has shown that ibrutinib is not a better strategy compared to conventional treatment with steroids and calcineurin inhibitors in the first-line setting. Moreover, recent data strongly encourages the development of steroid-free treatment regimens. Prof. Greinix also emphasizes the importance of investigating diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers for cGvHD, and to better understand both the pathophysiology of cGvHD and the mechanisms of action of new treatments. This will allow different phenotypes of cGvHD to be studied separately. This interview took place at the 6th Congress on Controversies in Stem Cell Transplantation and Cellular Therapies (COSTEM), which took place virtually.