Blinatumomab as second salvage therapy in adults with relapsed/refractory aggressive B-NHL

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Published: 13 Dec 2018
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Prof Alessandro Rambaldi - University of Milan, Milan, Italy

Prof Alessandro Rambaldi speaks to ecancer at ASH 2018 about the phase 2 study looking into blinatumomab as second salvage therapy in adults with relapsed/refractory aggressive B-NHL.

He explains that although the frontline treatment for NHL is very effective, the outcome for those who relapse is poor, hence the need for a second salvage therapy.

Prof Rambaldi reports that treatment with blinatumomab achieved a 37% overall response and that these patients could go on to receive an autologous stem cell transplant.

ecancer's filming has been kindly supported by Amgen through the ecancer Global Foundation. ecancer is editorially independent and there is no influence over content.

The study that we have been presenting in this meeting with blinatumomab in relapsed and refractory diffuse aggressive B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma was developed in a very peculiar setting because the front line treatment nowadays of non-Hodgkin lymphoma is very effective but the proportion of patients who eventually relapse do very poorly. Particularly this is true when considering patients that do not respond to salvage first therapy and the outcome for these patients is very poor. So this was the setting in which blinatumomab was tested and it was remarkable that with a reasonable safety profile this treatment was able to achieve 37% overall response rate and these patients could proceed to consolidate this response with an autologous or even an allogenic stem cell transplant. So this opens the door to a really innovative treatment chance for these unlucky patients.

What does this mean for doctors?

That means that we have the opportunity to propose an innovative treatment choice that is in the line of the new monoclonal antibody based therapy and the expanded immunotherapy in refractory relapsed diseases. So this is a very practical and feasible approach for the future of these very aggressive diseases.