Potential survival benefit for patients receiving autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation after checkpoint inhibitors for relapsed/refractory Hodgkin lymphoma: A real‐life experience

摘要

Abstract In recent years, novel drugs are available for the patients with relapsed/refractory Hodgkin lymphoma (HL), like immune checkpoint inhibitors (CPi). These drugs have been able to rescue a cohort of patients who subsequently could receive an allogeneic stem‐cell transplant (SCT). No data were reported for subsequent autologous SCT (ASCT) after CPi. Here, we report our real‐life experience in heavily pretreated HL patients undergoing ASCT as consolidation approach after CPi treatment. A retrospective observational study was conducted. Patients had CPi therapy in the context of clinical trials (n = 6) or in the named patient program (n = 7) between July 2014 and November 2019: 9 out of 13 received pembrolizumab and the remaining four underwent nivolumab. A median of 12 cycles (range, 3–16) of CPi therapy were infused. Thirteen patients underwent ASCT after CPi: 11 (84.6) patients obtained a complete response (CR) and 2 had progression of disease, with an overall response rate of 84.6. With a median follow‐up of 3.3 years (range, 1.1–5.5), only one CR patient had disease relapse after 3.9 months from ASCT, leading to an estimated disease‐free survival of 87.5 at 56.9 months. The estimated 5‐year progression‐free survival was 73.4 and overall survival was 92.3 at 4.8 years, respectively. No unexpected or cumulative toxicity was observed. Our results indicated that ASCT may represent a further effective therapeutic option as consolidation in HL after CPi treatment that today represents the last conventionally recognized therapeutic line.