Keytruda wins approval as combination therapy for kidney cancer

KENILWORTH: The US Food and Drug Administration has approved Merck’s cancer therapy, Keytruda, as part of a combination therapy for previously untreated patients with the most common type of kidney cancer, the company said on Monday.

The drug was approved in combination with Pfizer Inc’s Inlyta to treat advanced renal cell carcinoma.

The approval is based on findings from the pivotal Phase 3 KEYNOTE-426 trial, which demonstrated significant improvements in overall survival (OS), progression-free survival (PFS) and objective response rate (ORR) for Keytruda in combination with axitinib (KEYTRUDA-axitinib combination) compared to sunitinib.

“This represents a new treatment option for patients with advanced renal cell carcinoma, who will now have access to KEYTRUDA as part of a first-line combination regimen,” said Dr. Scot Ebbinghaus, vice president, clinical research, Merck Research Laboratories. “Today’s approval reflects Merck’s commitment to patients with cancer and further supports the use of Keytruda to help improve survival outcomes for patients with advanced renal cell carcinoma.”

Immune-mediated adverse reactions, which may be severe or fatal, can occur with Keytruda, including pneumonitis, colitis, hepatitis, endocrinopathies, nephritis and renal dysfunction, severe skin reactions, solid organ transplant rejection, and complications of allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT).

Based on the severity of the adverse reaction, Keytruda should be withheld or discontinued and corticosteroids administered if appropriate. Keytruda can also cause severe or life-threatening infusion-related reactions. Based on its mechanism of action, Keytruda can cause fetal harm when administered to a pregnant woman.

“Given the aggressive nature of the disease, many patients with advanced renal cell carcinoma need additional treatment options that can help improve survival outcomes,” said Dr. Brian Rini, medical oncologist at Cleveland Clinic Cancer Center and professor of medicine at the Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine of Case Western Reserve University. “Pembrolizumab in combination with axitinib offers an important new therapeutic option for physicians to consider when approaching initial treatment for patients newly diagnosed with advanced renal cell carcinoma.” Dr. Rini reports consulting and research funding from Merck.

About KEYNOTE-426

The approval was based on data from the pre-specified interim analysis of the Phase 3 KEYNOTE-426 trial, a randomized, multi-center, open-label trial conducted in 861 patients who had not received systemic therapy for advanced RCC. Patients were enrolled regardless of PD-L1 tumor expression status. Randomization was stratified by International Metastatic RCC Database Consortium (IMDC) risk categories (favorable versus intermediate versus poor) and geographic region (North America versus Western Europe versus “Rest of the World”). Patients with active autoimmune disease requiring systemic immunosuppression within the last two years were ineligible.

Patients were randomized (1:1) to one of the following treatment arms:

KEYTRUDA 200 mg intravenously every three weeks up to 24 months in combination with axitinib 5 mg orally, twice daily (n=432).

Sunitinib 50 mg orally, once daily for four weeks and then off treatment for two weeks (n=429).