ASH 2023 | SYMPATICO: Primary analysis results of ibrutinib plus venetoclax for patients with R/R MCL

So this is a Phase III study of ibrutinib versus the combination of ibrutinib plus venetoclax for the treatment of mantle cell lymphoma. And it’s a study that’s been many years in the making, so we’ve been waiting for these results for some years now. Now the background to this is that, as early as 2014, our group actually combined ibrutinib and venetoclax together in a Phase II study, and we showed that the response rates seemed to be very high and that some patients were able to get into deep remission and come off treatment for up to five years now. So that was published in New England, and we felt that it was a very exciting combination to take forward, but we needed a confirmatory Phase III study. 

So, a large multi-international study by the name of SYMPATICO was started. Patients with relapsed mantle cell lymphoma were assigned to either ibrutinib or ibrutinib plus venetoclax, and the primary endpoint was progression-free survival. And we’ve just reported for the first time the results from this study and it showed that the progression-free survival for patients taking the combination of ibrutinib and venetoclax is substantially better than those taking ibrutinib. 

So, you know, this is a really important study because we’re able to show that none of us were really sure how to use venetoclax in mantle cell lymphoma. So we know that it’s an active drug, but we know that using venetoclax by itself after ibrutinib failure doesn’t do very well. And I think what the SYMPATICO trial tells us, is that you can add venetoclax to ibrutinib and get really long remissions, and that might be the best place to use that really important drug in mantle cell lymphoma.