Complete and long-lasting clinical responses in immune checkpoint inhibitor-resistant, metastasized melanoma treated with adoptive T cell transfer combined with DC vaccination
Tanja Lövgren, Maria Wolodarski, Stina L. Wickström, Ulrika Edbäck, Mette Wallin, Eva Martell, Katrin Markland, Pontus Blomberg, Maria Nyström, Andreas Lundqvist, Hans Jacobsson, Gustav Ullenhag, Per Ljungman, Johan Hansson, Giuseppe Masucci, Roger Tell, Isabel Poschke, Lars Adamson, Jonas Mattsson, Rolf Kiessling
Abstract
F]-FDG PET/CT radiology was performed to evaluate clinical response, according to RECIST 1.1 (on the CT part). Immunological monitoring was performed by flow cytometry and T-cell receptor (TCR) sequencing. In the safety/optimization cohort, all patients had a mixed response or stable disease, but none durable. In the combination cohort, two patients experienced complete responses (CR) that are still ongoing (>36 and >18 months, respectively). In addition, two patients had partial responses (PR), one still ongoing (>42 months) with only a small bone-lesion remaining, and one of short duration (<4 months). One patient died early during treatment and did not receive DC. Long-lasting persistency of the injected TILs was demonstrated in blood. In summary, we report clinical responses by TIL therapy combined with DC vaccination in 4 out of 4 treated MM patients who previously failed ICI.