In short videos with accompanying text, Dr. Brian Koffman, the Executive Vice President (EVP) and Chief Medical Officer (CMO) of the CLL Society, takes us through his “Top 12” abstracts from ASCO or the American Society of Clinical Oncology Annual Meeting held virtually in May, 2020.
#1
ASCO 2020: Fixed-duration venetoclax-obinutuzumab for previously untreated patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia: Follow-up of efficacy and safety results from the multicenter, open-label, randomized, phase III CLL14 trial
The CLL14 study already definitely proven that the combination of venetoclax-obinutuzumab (VenG) was superior to chlorambucil-obinutuzumab (ClbG) in patients with previously untreated CLL.
For a more complete description of the trial and earlier data and my commentary on the trial design, see this earlier abstract review from ASCO 2019.
At this ASCO in 2020, the follow-up data was presented.
Takeaways:
- 432 patients were enrolled ½ or 216 receiving VenG and 216 or ½ receiving ClbG.
- After a median follow-up of approximately 40 months progression-free survival (PFS) continued to be superior for VenG as compared to ClbG.
- At 3 years, PFS was 81.9% in the VenG arm and 49.5% in the ClbG arm.
- This benefit was consistently observed across all clinical and biological risk groups.
- Assessment of minimal residual disease 18 months after end of treatment showed that 47.2% of patients in the VenG arm had undetectable minimal residual disease or uMRD (< 10−4).
Conclusions:
While it is no surprise that the combining obinutuzumab with the potent novel agent, venetoclax does much better for patients than combining it with the largely ineffective old chemo drug chlorambucil, this follow-up confirms that with only the 12 month fixed duration of VenG, its improved survival advantages continues for at least 3 years or longer.
Here is the ASCO 2020 abstract: Fixed-duration venetoclax-obinutuzumab for previously untreated patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia: Follow-up of efficacy and safety results from the multicenter, open-label, randomized, phase III CLL14 trial.
Do you agree with my choices? Let us know at [email protected]. We welcome your comments and suggestions.
Stay strong and safe. We are all in this together.
Brian Koffman MDCM (retired) MS Ed
Co-Founder, Executive VP and Chief Medical Officer
CLL Society, Inc.
