Immunotherapy and CAR T-Cell Therapy: Stephen M. Ansell, MD, PhD

This content originally appeared on our sister site, OncLive.

OncLive spoke with Stephen M. Ansell, MD, PhD, chair, Lymphoma Group, Mayo Clinic, about incorporating immunotherapies beyond chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy in non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL).

CAR T-cell therapy is associated with high rates of durable responses, but can be expensive and time consuming. As such, CAR T-cell therapy can elicit cures in a fraction of patients with NHL, Ansell adds.

However, data with immunotherapies, such as tafasitamab-cxix (Monjuvi) in combination with lenalidomide (Revlimid), are also demonstrating high rates of long-term, durable remissions, Ansell explains. As such, the overall utility of novel immunotherapies remains an unanswered question in NHL, Ansell says. However, they might offer a more accessible and cheaper alternative to CAR T-cell therapy without compromising efficacy, Ansell concludes.