Onkológia 6/2015

Immune checkpoint inhibitors in non-small cell lung cancer therapy

Recent years have brought new challenges for a clinician engaged in treatment of lung cancer. Advances in immunotherapy in the treatment of melanoma lead to increase of the number of studies in immunotherapy of other tumors. At present we are confronted with the fact that new drugs have been approved for immunotherapy of NSCLC. We feel a strong need for a speedy familiarization with the knowledge in this field both in terms of at least a basic understanding of the mechanisms of functioning of the immune system, and the new paradigms of treatment especially in the context of the assessment of response to treatment, which are significantly different from what we were used to in chemotherapy. This paper is designed as the first information for the clinician confronted with the possibility to use immunotherapy in the treatment of lung cancer. In the situation where new paradigms are only at the stage of initial formulations and the „dust has not settled yet“ we certainly did not avoid simplistic and non-rigorous formulations. Many things are likely to be modified in the near future. Nevertheless, we hope that the information we have attempted to summarize here may be useful for practicing clinician.

Keywords: PD-1 programmed death protein 1, cytotoxic T lymphocyte-associated antigen 4, immune checkpoint inhibitors, nivolumab, pembrolizumab, NSCLC.