Subcutaneous Treatments Can Save Chair Time, Decrease Infusion Reaction in NSCLC: Joshua K. Sabari, MD

Joshua K. Sabari, MD, director of High Reliability Organization Initiatives at NYU Langone Health's Perlmutter Cancer Center, explained the benefit of subcutaneous treatments entering the non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) space, as researchers continue to work toward the introduction of subcutaneous therapy to the space that would act as an alternative to intravenous (IV) treatment.

This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity; captions were auto-generated.

Transcript

How can subcutaneous treatments improve NSCLC care in the future?

Subcutaneous therapies are revolutionizing the care of therapy, or the care of cancer patient therapy. Now, first off, PD1 and PDL1 inhibitors—for example, nivolumab, atezolizumab, pembrolizumab—these are drugs that are now starting to be utilized in a subcutaneous formulation. And I think the benefit here for patients is decreased chair time, decreased wait, ease of use, and potentially, in the future, for financial purposes, may declutter and debulk the cancer centers, the inpatient units. Think about the future where these therapies may be able to be given in the home or in nursing centers, obviously, with appropriate oversight and appropriate care.

There are also subcutaneous formulations of medicines in the lung cancer space being developed in the EGFR mutation-positive (NSCLC) space. EGFR is quite common; it makes up 25% to 30% of all lung cancers. And one of the standard FDA-approved regimens right now in the frontline setting for activating mutations, EGFR exon 19 deletion or L858R in those patients with metastatic disease, is amivantamab and lazertinib. Amivantamab is an EGFR and MET bispecific antibody. It's currently given as an IV formulation. We are developing a subcutaneous formulation which dramatically decreases the rate of the infusion or injection time, decreasing chair time, leading to patient improvement and satisfaction, as well as, interestingly, a decreased rate of the infusion-related reaction, which we see in about two-thirds of patients getting IV formulations of amivantamab, and only about 10% or 1 in 10 patients getting the subcutaneous formulation.

I think in general, subcutaneous formulations of medicine are really revolutionizing care. I think we need to do it in a smart fashion. We need to do this with supervision, but also really need to keep patients in the center of the discussion and continue to do what's best for patient care.