Immunotherapy—a cancer treatment that boosts and uses the power of the patient’s immune system against cancer cells—has transformed lung cancer treatment, achieving long-term benefit in 20% to 30% of patients. However, most patients experience resistance to treatment, and physicians still cannot reliably predict which patients will benefit from immunotherapy. Today, treatment decisions rely heavily on the expression of PD-L1—a biomarker with well-known limitations.
“We need smarter tools,” said thoracic oncologist Marina Garassino, MD, professor of medicine at UChicago Medicine and senior author of the study.