The combination of the drug nivolumab with chemotherapy improves the survival of patients with high-risk head and neck cancer and could become the new therapeutic standard, according to the results of an international trial led by professionals from the Catalan Institute of Oncology (ICO) of the centres of Badalona and L’Hospitalet, the Germans Trias i Pujol Research Institute (IGTP) and the Bellvitge Biomedical Research Institute (IDIBELL).
The Phase III study has shown that adding nivolumab immunotherapy to routine cisplatin treatment and radiation therapy after surgery significantly increases disease-free survival. The results, recently published in the scientific journal The Lancet, represent the first relevant advance in more than two decades in this field.
A new treatment that could be established as a new therapeutic standard
The research included 680 patients from six European countries. At three years of follow-up, 63.1% of patients treated with the nivolumab-cisplatin combination and radiation therapy remained free of relapse, compared to 52.5% of patients who received standard treatment alone.
This benefit was consistently observed in all patients, regardless of PD-L1 biomarker expression. Although a modest increase in serious adverse effects was initially recorded, this difference was balanced out in subsequent controls.
“This is the first relevant clinical advance in more than 20 years in the treatment of high-risk squatous carcinoma of the head and neck operated on,” says Dr. Ricard Mesía, head of the Medical Oncology Service at ICO Badalona, researcher in the B-ARGO group of the Germans Trias i Pujol Research Institute and co-author of the study. According to Mesía, “immunotherapy has been shown to clearly improve the results of a treatment that was the standard since 2004. These results may change clinical practice and bring new hope to patients at higher risk of relapse.”
The Bellvitge Biomedical Research Institute (IDIBELL) is a research centre created in 2004 and specialising in cancer, neuroscience, translational medicine and regenerative medicine. It has a team of more than 1,500 professionals who, from 73 research groups, publish more than 1,400 scientific articles a year. IDIBELL is participated by the Bellvitge University Hospital and the Viladecans Hospital of the Institut Català de la Salut, the Institut Català d’Oncologia, the University of Barcelona and the City Council of L’Hospitalet de Llobregat.
IDIBELL is a member of the Campus d’Excelencia Internacional of the University of Barcelona HUBc and is part of the CERCA institution of the Generalitat de Catalunya. In 2009 it became one of the first five Spanish research centres accredited as a health research institute by the Carlos III Health Institute. In addition, it is part of the HR Excellence in Research program of the European Union and is a member of EATRIS and REGIC. Since 2018, IDIBELL has been an Accredited Centre of the AECC Scientific Foundation (FCAECC).