The 2013 American Society of Clinical Oncology annual meeting, held May 31 – June 1, in Chicago, afforded the opportunity to report three studies.
Crizotinib (Xalkori) Mechanism of Action
The first, “An examination of crizotinib activity in human tumor primary culture micro-spheroids isolated from patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer,” reports our experience using the EVA-PCD functional profiling platform to examine the drug crizotinib.
This small molecule originally developed as an inhibitor of the oncogenic pathway MET, was later found to be highly active in a subset of cancer patients who carried a novel gene rearrangement for anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK).
It was this observation that lead to the drug (sold under the name Xalkori) being approved for the treatment of advanced ALK mutation lung cancer. The subsequent observation that this same drug inhibited yet another gene target known as ROS-1 found in a subset of lung cancer patients, has led to its use in this patient population.
Our exploration of crizotinib activity identified a series of patients who received the drug and responded dramatically. This included both ALK positive and ROS-1 positive patients.
Stage 4 NSCLC (Non Small Cell Lung Cancer) Success
One patient however, appeared highly sensitive to the drug in our studies, but was found negative for the ALK gene rearrangement by genomic analysis.
We repeated our functional analysis only to the find again, the same high degree of crizotinib sensitivity. I felt confident the patient should receive crizotinib, but at the time the drug was not yet commercially available and he didn’t qualify for the protocols, as he was ALK negative.
I scoured the country looking for a way to get the patient treated with crizotinib. From Sloan Kettering to UCLA, no one could help. And then, in collaboration with my abstract co-author Ignatius Ou from UC Irvine, we decided to repeat the ALK analysis. That proved to be a very good idea.
For the patient was indeed positive for ALK gene rearrangement by second analysis and subsequently responded beautifully to a treatment for which he would not otherwise qualify.
Once again, phenotype trumped genotype. (The complete story of this patient can be found in Chapter 19 of my book Outliving Cancer, also a local TV station reported this story, click here for short video).
Success With Rare Pediatric Sarcoma Case
A final patient in the series represented a particularly interesting application of functional analysis. The patient, a young woman with an extremely rare pediatric sarcoma, had failed to respond to multiple courses of intensive chemotherapy and her family was desperate.
As she approached the end of her third year in high school, it looked unlikely that she would reach her senior year.
A portion of her tumor was submitted for analysis.
The results confirmed relative resistance to chemotherapeutics, many of which she had already received and failed, but showed exquisite sensitivity to crizotinib. Indeed, our inclusion of crizotinib in the analysis reflected our intense effort to identify any activity for this previously refractory patient.
We reported our findings to the pediatric oncologist and encouraged them to consider an ALK rearrangement analysis, despite this particular pathway not being on anyone’s radar prior to our study.
The result – a positive gene rearrangement. This led to a successful petition to the drug company for the use of this agent for an off-label indication.
The response was prompt and dramatic, and remains durable to this day, nearly a year later. Again, the phenotypic analysis guided us to the correct genomic finding.
Our other presentations at this year’s meetings will be reported in future blogs.
As always, I appreciate your thoughts and comments.