Bhagirathbhai R. Dholaria, MD, on Evaluating Allogeneic CAR-T P-BCMA-ALLO1 in R/R Multiple Myeloma

“Given the fact that this is an allogenic product, it's readily available. There is no leukapheresis needed. There is no waiting for manufacturing, which is a huge issue in autologous BCMA-targeted CAR T-cell therapy, which is takes anywhere from 4 to 6 weeks from the time of leukapheresis to actual cell infusion. Many of our high-risk patients are not able to wait that long, and they end up requiring bridging therapy, which none of the patients on this trial needed because P-BCMA-ALLO1 was available right away.”

Patients with relapsed/refractory (r/r) multiple myeloma (MM) have several treatment options, from chemotherapy regimens to several FDA-approved autologous chimeric antigen receptor T-cell (CAR-T) therapies. Despite these options, however, substantial unmet need remains, and many new treatment options are currently in development to address gaps in eligibility and shortcomings in safety and efficacy of current treatment options. One such new treatment option currently in development is Poseida Therapeutics’ P-BCMA-ALLO1, an allogeneic BCMA-directed CAR-T therapy, which is being evaluated in an ongoing phase 1/1b clinical trial (NCT04960579) in r/r MM. Notably, interim results from this clinical trial were recently presented at the 21st International Myeloma Society (IMS) Annual Meeting, held September 25 to 28, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Following the conference, CGTLive® got in touch with trial investigator Bhagirathbhai R. Dholaria, MD, an associate professor of medicine in malignant hematology & stem cell transplantation at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, to learn more about the data. Dholaria explained what differentiates P-BCMA-ALLO1 from current FDA-approved CAR-T therapies for MM, pointing out that it is allogeneic rather than autologous and that it is engineered with a nonviral gene-editing approach. Afterwards he spoke about the promising safety and efficacy results, highlighting the nonoccurrence of graft versus host disease in the treated patients and the 91% overall response rate in the enhanced lymphodepletion arm.

REFERENCES
1. Poseida Therapeutics garners FDA RMAT designation for allogeneic CAR-T P-BCMA-ALLO1 in r/r multiple myeloma. News release. Poseida Therapeutics, Inc. September 27, 2024. Accessed October 10, 2024. https://investors.poseida.com/news-releases/news-release-details/poseida-therapeutics-reports-positive-interim-phase-1-results