Immunotherapy and Neuroendocrine Neoplasms

Immunotherapy and Neuroendocrine Neoplasms

Updated 24th September 2025. Introduction There's a lot of Immunotherapy stuff out there!  The picture regarding its use in Neuroendocrine Neoplasms is not clear and there is no general roadmap printed.  I first heard of Immunotherapy for NETs following attendance at ENETS 2017 in Barcelona. The presentation that sticks out was one given by Dr Matthew Kulke, a well-known NET Specialist in Boston. My reaction to the presentation was one of 'expectation management' and caution i.e. it's too soon to know if we will get any success and when we will get it. He also hinted that it's more likely…
Read More
Assessment of Clinical Response Following Atezolizumab and Bevacizumab Treatment in Patients With Neuroendocrine Tumors: A Nonrandomized Clinical Trial

Assessment of Clinical Response Following Atezolizumab and Bevacizumab Treatment in Patients With Neuroendocrine Tumors: A Nonrandomized Clinical Trial

Background Well differentiated NETs have been described as an "immunological desert" in recent years mainly due to the poor response rate data coming out of clinical trials of immunotherapy drugs.  Poorly differentiated NEC has favoured better but mainly in the more obscure types.  Which is why these data of a combo treatment containing one immunotherapy drug caught my eye. What is atezolizumab?  It is a type of monoclonal antibody and a type of immune checkpoint inhibitor.  It's a Programmed cell death protein -1 (PD-1)/ Ligand 1 (PD-L1) inhibitor.  A drug that binds to the protein PD-L1 to help immune cells…
Read More
Clinical Trial:  Dostarlimab, anti–PD-1 monoclonal antibody in Neuroendocrine Carcinoma

Clinical Trial: Dostarlimab, anti–PD-1 monoclonal antibody in Neuroendocrine Carcinoma

BackgroundFollowing the Americal Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) conference in June 2022 (ASCO is the biggest Oncology event in the world), the media widely featured the results of the Phase 2 clinical trial of the drug Dostarlimab, an anti–PD-1 monoclonal antibody. The media often looks for headline-grabbing stories and this was one of them.  One UK TV outlet said they may have found the cure for cancer, which is a reckless statement when you look at the size and boundary of the clinical trial referenced.  The detail is, that this was a phase 2 trial for "rectal adenocarcinoma", but specifically…
Read More