Dr. Siddiqi on Liso-Cel in the TRANSCEND CLL 004 Study

Tanya Siddiqi, MD, of the City of Hope Cancer Center in Duarte, California, met with Blood Cancers Today to share data from the phase I/II TRANSCEND CLL 004 trial on lisocabtagene maraleucel (liso-cel), a chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy, in patients with relapsed or refractory chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) or small lymphocytic lymphoma.

“Among 80 or so patients who had failed both [Bruton’s tyrosine kinase (BTK)] inhibitor therapy and venetoclax, we saw … excellent remission responses, which means that about 30 days after they received their CAR T-cells, 20% of patients had achieved a complete remission where no disease was detectable,” Dr. Siddiqi explained. She added that almost all of these patients had negative measurable residual disease status in bone marrow and peripheral blood.

The rate of complete remission was “fairly similar” in the remaining patients who had not yet failed on venetoclax after failing BTK inhibitor therapy, according to Dr. Siddiqi.

Dr. Siddiqi also commented on future avenues of research for liso-cel in the relapsed or refractory CLL population.

“The goal of our future research will … look into things like how can we treat patients earlier, especially patients with high-risk disease so that we don’t have to wait for five lines of therapy before we give them CAR T-cells,” she said.

Other potential areas of research (now that liso-cel is commercially available) could include therapy combinations, optimal bridging regimens, and avenues “to take this potentially life changing therapy to more and more people with relapsed CLL disease, essentially like we’ve already done for aggressive lymphomas,” Dr. Siddiqi stated.

In closing, Dr. Siddiqi encouraged physicians and patients to seek out clinical trials and research programs and contact centers of excellence to participate in studies so that therapies continue to be developed for patients with CLL and other diseases.