Stephen Liu, MD, on the Impact the IMpower010 Trial at ASCO 2021

At ASCO 2021, Stephen Liu, MD, discussed his excitement for results of the IMpower010 trial of atezolizumab in patients with early-stage resected non–small cell lung cancer

CancerNetwork® sat down with Stephen Liu, MD, of the Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center, at the 2021 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting to talk about the results of the phase 3 IMpower010 trial (NCT02486718) of atezolizumab (Tecentriq) versus best supportive care for the treatment of patients with stage IB to IIIA surgically resected non–small cell lung cancer.

Transcription

I think at ASCO 2021, the one abstract we’re really waiting to see and the results that we want to pour over are the results from IMpower010. This is the adjuvant study of atezolizumab and the first study showing us a benefit with immunotherapy after surgical resection compared with placebo in a randomized trial. Looking at immunotherapy for patients with completely resected non–small cell lung cancer after chemotherapy and immunotherapy has been a transformative treatment for metastatic lung cancer. We also know that for patients with resected lung cancer, while our goal is cure, it’s not always our expectation. Lung cancer is a very difficult disease to eradicate. Implementing immunotherapy in that setting really can improve our outcomes and extend the cure to more people coupled with earlier detection and screening. I think this has a chance to make a huge impact for patients with lung cancer.

Reference

Wakelee HA, Altorki NK, Zhou C, et al. IMpower010: primary results of a phase III global study of atezolizumab versus best supportive care after adjuvant chemotherapy in resected stage IB-IIIA non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). J Clin Oncol. 2021;39(suppl 15):8500. doi:10.1200/JCO.2021.39.15_suppl.8500