Results of the NICHE-2 trial show it to be highly effective in a subset of patients with colon cancer – The Netherlands Cancer Institute

The Netherlands Cancer Institute shared on Linkedin:

“More succes for neoadjuvant immunotherapy: results of the NICHE-2 trial show it to be highly effective in a subset of patients with colon cancer. The treatment, which consisted of two cycles of immunotherapy prior to surgery, was effective in almost all patients. In two third of patients, there were no longer any live tumor cells at the time of surgery.

Patients with colon cancer with a specific genetic makeup, known as mismatch-repair deficient (dMMR) or microsatellite instable (MSI) were treated with one cycle of ipilimumab and two cycles of nivolumab. In 95% of patients, the tumor was either complete or almost completely gone, which was measured as 10% or less cancer cells found at the time of surgery. In 68% of patients there were no live cancer cells.

Myriam Chalabi, ‘Now, more than two years after treatment, none of the patients saw recurrence even though many had high-risk tumors. The results are unprecedented. The efficacy as well as the side-effects are much better compared to chemotherapy before surgery, a treatment that only works in 1 out of 20 patients.’

‘We have reached the point where we can forgo chemotherapy before surgery in this and comparable studies in patients with colorectal cancer who respond well to neoadjuvant immunotherapy. The next and crucial step is to make this treatment available as a standard treatment. That is what we are currently working towards. And eventually we hope to even provide the option of avoiding surgery in patients who respond well.’

These groundbreaking discoveries were made as part of the NICHE-2 trial at the Netherlands Cancer Institute and have been published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) Group.”

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Source: The Netherlands Cancer Institute/LinkedIn