Adding a PD-1 or PD-L1 inhibitor to a chemotherapy backbone: first-line chemoimmunotherapy in cervical, biliary and anal cancer, the neoadjuvant setting in triple-negative breast cancer, and whether the survival benefit seen at the first readout holds at four and five years.
In the randomized, open-label COMMIT trial (NRG-GI004/SWOG-S1610), 82 patients with previously untreated dMMR/MSI-H metastatic colorectal cancer were randomized 1:1 to mFOLFOX6/bevacizumab/atezolizumab (FFX/bev/atezo) or atezolizumab alone. At the November 6, 2025 cutoff (median follow-up 46 months), progression-free survival favored the combination: HR=0.42 (95% CI, 0.22–0.80; P=0.0068), with median PFS of 24.5 versus 5.3 months.
An exploratory analysis of the phase 3 KEYNOTE-826 trial reports that adding pembrolizumab to platinum-based chemotherapy (with or without bevacizumab) continues to show longer overall and progression-free survival than chemotherapy alone in persistent, recurrent, or metastatic cervical cancer, at a median follow-up of roughly five years (59.1 months).
A randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled phase 3 trial (NSABP B-59/GBG 96-GeparDouze) tested whether adding the PD-L1 inhibitor atezolizumab to neoadjuvant chemotherapy, followed by adjuvant atezolizumab, would improve outcomes over chemotherapy alone in 1,550 patients with stage II–III triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC).
The FDA approved retifanlimab, a PD-1-targeting checkpoint inhibitor, in combination with carboplatin and paclitaxel for first-line treatment and as a single agent for second-line treatment of squamous cell carcinoma of the anal canal (SCAC) — the first checkpoint inhibitor approval in this disease.
Final post hoc analysis of the global, double-blind, placebo-controlled phase 3 TOPAZ-1 trial (685 patients randomized 1:1) reporting the longest published follow-up — approximately 4 years — of an immunotherapy-plus-chemotherapy regimen in first-line advanced biliary tract cancer (aBTC)