MIA researchers showcase new frontier in melanoma treatment at ASCO 2022

Melanoma Institute Australia is taking centre stage at the prestigious American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting in Chicago, showcasing the new frontier in melanoma treatment.

MIA researchers are presenting an unheralded three orals, chairing and speaking at an ASCO education session, and delivering more than 20 other presentations and abstracts, reflecting the ground-breaking and life-saving work being undertaken at Melanoma Institute Australia.

‘To say we are punching above our weight is an understatement,’ said Professor Georgina Long AO, Co-Medical Director of Melanoma Institute Australia, University of Sydney, who is heading to Chicago to present two orals and a plenary session on critical melanoma research breakthroughs.

‘Australia leads the world in melanoma rates so is fitting that we also lead the world in research and clinical advances to save lives from melanoma, and we are proud to share our learnings with our international counterparts,’ she said.

‘Amongst the breakthroughs being presented are the success of drug therapy in preventing disease spread in high risk early stage melanoma patients, and the use of a new type of immunotherapy combination to double progression free survival for advanced melanoma patients,’ added Professor Richard Scolyer AO, Co-Medical Director of Melanoma Institute Australia, University of Sydney.

In a breakthrough which looks set to change clinical practice globally, Professor Long will give a prestigious oral presentation on latest results from the two-year KEYNOTE-716 trial. It involved 976 high risk early stage patients who had undergone surgery to have their primary disease removed. Early results revealed that giving these patients the same immunotherapy drugs approved for use in advanced patients, reduced their risk of disease recurrence (local or distant) by 35%.

At ASCO, Professor Long will provide the first analysis of the treatment’s effectiveness in preventing distant metastases, or disease spread to distant organs.

‘These patients historically have a high risk of relapse and disease recurrence after 24 months with poor outcomes,’ Professor Long said. ‘Rather than having to wait and see if their melanoma would return, this trial uses drugs to mop up any cancer cells that may remain after surgery.

Results show it is effective in stopping these patients from progressing to advanced melanoma, which represents a significant step forward in our mission to reach zero deaths from melanoma.’

Professor Long will also deliver an oral plenary session on the RELATIVITY-047 clinical trial, which showed the effectiveness of combining LAG-3 inhibitor relatlimab with nivolumab (an immune checkpoint inhibitor targeting the PD-1 protein) for previously untreated advanced melanoma patients.

In another oral, Professor Long will focus on follow up from the Neo-Trio clinical trial, which used the ground breaking neoadjuvant platform to quickly assess which drugs in which combination were most effective in preventing Stage III patients from progressing to advanced disease.

More than 20 other Melanoma Institute Australia research projects are also featuring at ASCO, including the analysis of drugs targeting liver metastases, and long term results of clinical trials using immunotherapy to tackle various stages of disease.

‘Melanoma Institute Australia’s research output is fuelling global efforts to save lives from melanoma and we are extremely proud of the leading role our team continues to play in pushing the research and scientific boundaries,’ Professor Richard Scolyer added.

‘Our advances will not only save lives from melanoma, but also stand to extend to treatment of other cancers too.’

For the complete list of Melanoma Institute Australia’s unprecedented and wide-ranging contribution to ASCO 2022, please see below. For a snapshot, you can view some of MIA’s poster presentations here.

ASCO 2022 – Melanoma Institute Australia Contribution

Invited Speakers

1. Georgina Long – 2022 ASCO Annual Meeting – Education Session Chair – Exploring the Use of Approved Doublets in Melanoma: Which Patients Need Them and How Could They Be Sequenced?

2. Georgina Long – 2022 ASCO Annual Meeting – Education Session Speaker – Updates on Abstract 360385: Relatlimab and nivolumab versus nivolumab in previously untreated metastatic or unresectable melanoma: Overall survival and response rates from RELATIVITY-047 (CA224-047)

3. Alex Van Akkooi – 2022 Annual Meeting – Case-Based Panel – A Surgical Perspective

Oral Abstract Presentation

MIA Presenting

4. Georgina V. Long, Matteo S. Carlino, George Au-Yeung, Andrew John Spillane, Kerwin Frank Shannon, David E. Gyorki, Julie R. Howle, Sydney Ch’ng, Maria Gonzalez, Robyn P.M. Saw, Thomas Pennington, Serigne N. Lo, Richard A. Scolyer, Alexander M. Menzies – NeoTrio: Randomized trial of neoadjuvant (NAT) pembrolizumab (Pembro) alone, in sequence (SEQ) with, or concurrent (CON) with dabrafenib plus trametinib (D+T) in resectable BRAF-mutant stage III melanoma to determine optimal combination of therapy – oral presentation

5. Georgina V. Long, Jason J. Luke, Muhammad Khattak, Luis de la Cruz Merino, Michele Del Vecchio, Piotr Rutkowski, Francesco Spagnolo, Jacek Mackiewicz, Vanna Chiarion-Sileni, John M. Kirkwood, Caroline Robert, Jean-Jacques Grob, Federica de Galitiis, Dirk Schadendorf, Matteo S. Carlino, Larry Wu, Mizuho Fukunaga-Kalabis, Clemens Krepler, Alexander M. Eggermont, Paolo Antonio Ascierto – Distant metastasis-free survival with pembrolizumab versus placebo as adjuvant therapy in stage IIB or IIC melanoma: The phase 3 KEYNOTE-716 study – oral presentation

MIA Contributing

6. Christian U. Blank, Irene L.M. Reijers, Robyn P.M. Saw, Judith M. Versluis, Thomas Pennington, Ellen Kapiteijn, Astrid Aplonia Maria Van Der Veldt, Karijn Suijkerbuijk, Geke Hospers, Winan J. van Houdt, W. Martin. C. Klop, Karolina Sikorska, Jos A. Van Der Hage, Dirk J. Grunhagen, Andrew J Colebatch, Andrew John Spillane, Bart A. van de Wiel, Alexander M. Menzies, Alexander Christopher Jonathan Van Akkooi, Georgina V. Long – Survival data of PRADO: A phase 2 study of personalized response-driven surgery and adjuvant therapy after neoadjuvant ipilimumab (IPI) and nivolumab (NIVO) in resectable stage III melanoma – oral presentation

7. Hussein A. Tawbi, F. Stephen Hodi, Evan J. Lipson, Dirk Schadendorf, Paolo Antonio Ascierto, Luis Matamala, Pamela Salman, Erika Castillo Gutiérrez, Piotr Rutkowski, Helen Gogas, Christopher D. Lao, Juliana Janoski De Menezes, Stéphane Dalle, Ana Maria Arance, Jean-Jacques Grob, Sarah Keidel, Karin Jonczak, Anne Marie Sobiesk, Sonia Dolfi, Georgina V. Long – Nivolumab (NIVO) + relatlimab (RELA) versus NIVO in previously untreated metastatic or unresectable melanoma: OS and ORR by key subgroups from RELATIVITY-047 – oral presentation

Abstracts for Poster Presentation

MIA Presenting

8. Amelia M. Taylor, Claire Galea, Serigne N. Lo, Florentia Dimitriou, Sarah Jacques, Clara Allayous, Hui-Ling Yeoh, Julia M. Ressler, Katharina C. Kähler, Lucia Festino, Julia Katharina Schwarze, Alexandre M. Wicky, Joanna Placzke, Douglas Buckner Johnson, Lisa Zimmer, Celeste Lebbe, Reinhard Dummer, Matteo S. Carlino, Georgina V. Long, Alexander M. Menzies – Efficacy and safety of “second adjuvant” therapy with BRAF/MEK inhibitors after resection of recurrent melanoma following adjuvant PD-1-based immunotherapy – poster presentation

9. Alexander M. Menzies, Robyn P.M. Saw, Serigne N. Lo, Maria Gonzalez, Sydney Ch’ng, Omgo E. Nieweg, Kerwin Frank Shannon, Peter M. Ferguson, Jenny HJ Lee, Helen Rizos, Robert V Rawson, Jonathan Stretch, John F. Thompson, Louise Emmett, Rony Kapoor, Andrew John Spillane, Richard A. Scolyer, Georgina V. Long – Neoadjuvant dabrafenib and trametinib (D+T) for stage III melanoma: Long-term results from the NeoCombi trial – poster presentation

10. Ann Livingstone, Alexander M. Menzies, Kirsten Howard, Martin R. Stockler, Rachael L. Morton – Preferences for adjuvant immunotherapy in patients with resected stage III melanoma: A discrete choice experiment – poster presentation

11. Catriona Harvey, Kazi Jannatun Nahar, Serigne N. Lo, Tasnia Ahmed, Sheima Farag, Nadia Yousaf, Kate Young, Liselotte Tas, Aafke Meerveld-Eggink, Christian U. Blank, Austin Thomas, Jennifer Leigh McQuade, Bastian Schilling, Douglas Buckner Johnson, Roberto Martin Huertas, Ana Maria Arance, Joanna Lee, Lisa Zimmer, Georgina V. Long, Alexander M. Menzies – Management of infliximab-refractory immune checkpoint inhibitor gastrointestinal toxicity: A multicenter case series – poster presentation

12. Ines Esteves Domingues Pires Da Silva, Serigne N. Lo, Jordan W. Conway, Richard A. Scolyer, Matteo S. Carlino, Alexander M. Menzies, Georgina V. Long – VEGF inhibitors (VEGFi) activity in liver metastases (mets) regardless of primary cancer type: Meta-analysis and systematic review – poster presentation

13. Serigne N. Lo, Tuba Nur Gide, Maria Gonzalez, Ines Silva, Alexander M. Menzies, Matteo S. Carlino, Richard A. Scolyer, Stephane Heritier, James S. Wilmott, Georgina V. Long – A biomarker-guided Bayesian response-adaptive phase II trial for metastatic melanoma: The Personalized Immunotherapy Platform (PIP) trial design – poster presentation

MIA Contributing

14. Antoni Ribas, Pier Francesco Ferrucci, Victoria Atkinson, Rosalie Stephens, Georgina V. Long, Donald P. Lawrence, Michele Del Vecchio, Omid Hamid, Henrik Schmidt, Jacob Schachter, Paola Queirolo, Wilson H. Miller, Matteo S. Carlino, Anna Maria Di Giacomo, Inge Marie Svane, Razi Ghori, Rohini Singh, Scott J. Diede, Paolo Antonio Ascierto – Pembrolizumab (pembro) plus dabrafenib (dab) and trametinib (tram) in BRAFV600E/K-mutant melanoma: Long-term follow-up of KEYNOTE-022 parts 1, 2, and 3. – poster presentation

15. Brian Gastman, Caroline Robert, Helen Gogas, Piotr Rutkowski, Georgina V. Long, Marya F. Chaney, Harshada Joshi, Yu-Lin Lin, Wendy Snyder, Jason Alan Chesney – Primary analysis of a phase 2, open-label, multicenter trial of talimogene laherparepvec (T-VEC) plus pembrolizumab (pembro) for the treatment (Tx) of patients (pts) with advanced melanoma (MEL) who progressed on prior anti–PD-1 therapy: MASTERKEY-115. – poster presentation

16. Dirk Schadendorf, Axel Hauschild, Mario Mandalà, John M. Kirkwood, Caroline Robert, Jean-Jacques Grob, Paul D. Nathan, Michael A. Davies, Hiya Banerjee, Rohan Shah, Mike R. Lau, Reinhard Dummer, Georgina V. Long – Adjuvant dabrafenib plus trametinib (D + T) versus placebo in patients with resected stage III BRAFV600-mutant melanoma: Updated 5-year distant metastases-free survival (DMFS) analysis of COMBI-AD. – poster presentation

17. Irene L.M. Reijers, Petros Dimitriadis, Elisa A. Rozeman, Oscar Krijgsman, Sten Cornelissen, Linda J.W. Bosch, Annegien Broeks, Alexander M. Menzies, Bart A. van de Wiel, Richard A. Scolyer, Georgina V. Long, Christian U. Blank – The interferon-gamma (IFN-y) signature from baseline tumor material predicts pathologic response after neoadjuvant ipilimumab (IPI) + nivolumab (NIVO) in stage III melanoma. – poster presentation

18. Judith M. Versluis, Karolina Sikorska, Elisa A. Rozeman, Alexander M. Menzies, Hanna Eriksson, W. Martin. C. Klop, Robyn P.M. Saw, Bart A. van de Wiel, Richard A. Scolyer, Johannes V. van Thienen, Henk Mallo, Maria Gonzalez, Alex Torres Acosta, Lindsay G. Grijpink-Ongering, Anja van der Wal, John B. A. G. Haanen, Alexander Christopher Jonathan Van Akkooi, Georgina V. Long, Christian U. Blank – Survival update of neoadjuvant ipilimumab + nivolumab in macroscopic stage III melanoma: The OpACIN and OpACIN-neo trials. – poster presentation

19. Maartje W. Rohaan, Lisanne P. Zijlker, Emma H.A. Stahlie, Viola Franke, Sofie Wilgenhof, Vincent van der Noort, Alexander Christopher Jonathan Van Akkooi, John B. A. G. Haanen – Neo-adjuvant T-VEC plus nivolumab combination therapy for resectable early-stage or metastatic (IIIB-IVM1a) melanoma with injectable disease: The NIVEC trial. – poster presentation

20. Michael White, Christopher P. Vellano, Miles Cameron Andrews, Russell G. Witt, Manoj Chelvanambi, Jennifer Leigh McQuade, Elizabeth M. Burton, Yanshuo Chu, Matthew J Lastrapes, Mike R. Lau, Hiya Banerjee, Alexander J. Lazar, Michael A. Davies, Scott Eric Woodman, Linghua Wang, Amy E. Moran, Georgina V. Long, Timothy Heffernan, Joe R. Marszalek, Jennifer Ann Wargo – Androgen receptor blockade promotes response to BRAF/MEK-targeted therapy. – poster presentation

21. Minke W. Lucas, Judith Lijnsvelt, Saskia Pulleman, Richard A. Scolyer, Alexander M. Menzies, Alexander Christopher Jonathan Van Akkooi, Winan J. van Houdt, Kerwin Frank Shannon, Thomas Pennington, Karijn Suijkerbuijk, Ellen Kapiteijn, Astrid Aplonia Maria Van Der Veldt, Matteo S. Carlino, Shahneen Sandhu, Maria Gonzalez, Charlotte L. Zuur, W. Martin. C. Klop, Georgina V. Long, Christian U. Blank – The NADINA trial: A multicenter, randomised, phase 3 trial comparing the efficacy of neoadjuvant ipilimumab plus nivolumab with standard adjuvant nivolumab in macroscopic resectable stage III melanoma. – poster presentation

22. Muhammad Adnan Khattak, Jason J. Luke, Georgina V. Long, Paolo Antonio Ascierto, Piotr Rutkowski, Dirk Schadendorf, Caroline Robert, Jean-Jacques Grob, Luis de la Cruz Merino, Michele Del Vecchio, Francesco Spagnolo, Jacek Mackiewicz, Vanna Chiarion -Sileni, Matteo S. Carlino, Peter Mohr, Ruixuan Jiang, Mizuho Fukunaga-Kalabis, Clemens Krepler, Alexander M. Eggermont, John M. Kirkwood – Health-related quality of life (HRQoL) with pembrolizumab (pembro) in resected high-risk stage II melanoma in the phase 3 KEYNOTE-716 study. – poster presentation

23. Roger Olofsson Bagge, Carl Jacob Holmberg, Tina J. Hieken, Jonathan S. Zager, Georgina V. Long, Alexander Christopher Jonathan Van Akkooi, Giorgos C Karakousis, Lalit Pallan, John T. Vetto, David E. Gyorki, Paolo Antonio Ascierto, Reinhard Dummer, Jane Yuet Ching Hui, Jacob Schachter, Hildur Helgadottir, Hidde Kroon, Luke Daniel Rothermel, Matteo S. Carlino, Kristy Kummerow Broman, Lars Ny – The efficacy of immune checkpoint blockade for melanoma in-transit with or without nodal metastases: A multicenter cohort study – poster presentation

24. Reinhard Dummer, Georgina V. Long, Hussein A. Tawbi, Keith Flaherty, Paolo Antonio Ascierto, Paul D. Nathan, Piotr Rutkowski, Oleg Leonov, Mario Mandalà, Paul Lorigan, Pier Francesco Ferrucci, Jean-Jacques Grob, Nicolas Meyer, Helen Gogas, Daniil Stroyakovskiy, Ana Maria Arance, Neha Pakhle, Sorcha Waters, Antoni Ribas, Dirk Schadendorf – Dabrafenib (D) and trametinib (T) plus spartalizumab (S) in patients (pts) with previously untreated BRAF V600–mutant unresectable or metastatic melanoma: Three-year overall survival (OS) data from the randomized part 3 of the phase III COMBI-i trial. – poster presentation

Abstracts for Publication only

25. Alexander Varey, Georgina V. Long, Richard A. Scolyer, Jeffrey E. Gershenwald, Julie Simon, John F. Thompson, Serigne N. Lo – A tool to predict survival outcomes and guide adjuvant immunotherapy recommendations for patients with stage II melanoma – publication only

26. James S. Wilmott, Hiya Banerjee, Philippe Saiag, Caroline Robert, Jean-Jacques Grob, Georgina V. Long, Michael A. Davies – Association of baseline corticosteroid treatment with outcomes for patients (pts) with BRAF-mutant melanoma brain metastases (MBMs) in COMBI-MB treated with dabrafenib and trametinib (DT). – publication only

27. Julia Elizabeth Lai-Kwon, Sarah Jacques, Matteo S. Carlino, Naima Benannoune, Caroline Robert, Clara Allayous, Barouyr Baroudjian, Celeste Lebbe, Lisa Zimmer, Zeynep Eroglu, Turkan Ozturk Topcu, Florentia Dimitriou, Andrew Mark Haydon, Serigne N. Lo, Alexander M. Menzies, Georgina V. Long, Efficacy of ipilimumab 3mg/kg following progression on low dose ipilimumab in metastatic melanoma – publication only