• Posted December 6, 2024

New Therapy Helps Patients With Tough-to-Treat Bladder Cancers

There's new hope for people battling advanced bladder cancer who do not respond to first-line therapy, researchers report.

An experimental new drug with the unwieldy name of cretostimogene grenadenorepvec spurred complete remission of the cancer in three-quarters of patients who hadn't responded to an immune-focused treatment typically used to fight the disease.

"These findings address a significant unmet need for bladder cancer patients and could improve their quality of life," said lead researcher Dr. Mark Tyson, a urologic oncologist at the Mayo Clinic Comprehensive Cancer Center in Rochester, Minn.

His team presented its findings Thursday in Dallas at the annual meeting of the Society of Urologic Oncology.

According to the American Cancer Society, over 83,000 new cases of bladder cancer are diagnosed among Americans each year, with almost 17,000 deaths linked to the disease. The cancer typically strikes older people and men are at higher risk than women.

As the researchers explained, first-line therapy for bladder cancer typically involves a therapeutic vaccine called Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG).

BCG was developed as far back as 1921, and it's also used to fight tuberculosis. But cancer doctors realized that BCG could set up an immune response in the bladder that drew immune cells to the organ, where they could battle cancer cells.

However, not every patient responds to BCG therapy, Tyson and crew noted.

The new study enrolled 110 patients who had failed BCG therapy. They received intermittent doses of cretostimogene grenadenorepvec within the bladder over a period of three years.

According to a news release from Mayo, "nearly 75% experienced complete cancer remission, with many remaining cancer-free beyond two years."

The clinic went on to add that "most participants did not require bladder removal surgery, and the treatment was well tolerated with minimal serious side effects."

The researchers plan more trials to see if the new treatment works over the longer term, and whether combining it with other therapies might boost benefits even further.

"We now know this treatment can be both effective and safe, potentially reducing the need for bladder removal surgery and providing a much-needed alternative for patients with limited options," Tyson said.

Because these findings were presented at a medical meeting, they should be considered preliminary until published in a peer-reviewed journal.

More information

Find out more about bladder cancer at the American Cancer Society.

SOURCE: Mayo Clinic, news release, Dec. 5, 2024