Marina Chiara Garassino, Professor at University of Chicago, shared on LinkedIn:
“Five years on – and the benefit is still there.
KEYNOTE-671 asked a simple question: if we give immunotherapy around surgery for early-stage lung cancer – before, to shrink the tumour, and after, to clear what remains – do patients live longer, cancer-free?
With five years of follow-up, published in Annals of Oncology, the answer is yes:
- 50% of patients on perioperative pembrolizumab were alive and cancer-free at five years – nearly double the 27% with chemotherapy alone
- 65% were alive at five years, vs 54%
- In 22% of patients, no cancer cells at all remained in the tissue removed at surgery (vs 5%)
Crucially, quality of life was not compromised, and no new late side effects emerged over five years of follow-up.
These are the longest data yet for immunotherapy given around surgery in early lung cancer, and they confirm this approach as a standard of care for resectable stage II–III NSCLC.
Proud to be the last and senior author of this study – led by Heather Wakelee and a remarkable international team – and grateful to do this work at University of Chicago, UChicago Medicine and the University of Chicago Medicine Comprehensive Cancer Center.
For a patient facing lung cancer surgery, five cancer-free years is not a statistic.
It is birthdays, graduations, ordinary days – given back.”
Title: Five-year outcomes of perioperative pembrolizumab for early-stage non-small-cell lung cancer from the randomized KEYNOTE-671 study
Authors: Heather Wakelee, John D. Spicer, S. Gao, M. Liberman, Masahiro Tsuboi, T. Kato, K.-N. Chen, C. Dooms, M. Majem, G. L. Martinengo, O. Bylicki, D. Rodríguez-Abreu, B. Halmos, David R. Jones, J. E. Chaft, M. Reck, E. Jensen, S. M. Keller, A. Samkari, Marina C. Garassino
To which, Martin Reck, Chief Physician at LungenClinic Grosshansdorf, added:
“Grateful to be part of this transformational study.”
You can also read: KEYNOTE-671: Perioperative Pembrolizumab Redefines Curative-Intent Therapy in Resectable NSCLC.
