The first two patients have been registered to a recently opened gynaecological cancer trial run by the CR UK & UCL Cancer Trials Centre.
PROMPT is a phase 2 study for patients with recurrent ovarian, fallopian tube or peritoneal cancer. The trial will investigate the role of an immunotherapy drug called pembrolizumab following previous weekly paclitaxel treatment for those who enter. Opened across 3 sites, the study aims to see if pembrolizumab can increase the time a patient lives with ovarian cancer without the disease getting worse. PROMPT aims to recruit 28 patients in total.
Tami Grunewald, Clinical Research Fellow for PROMPT, explained in more detail:
‘Women with platinum resistant ovarian cancer have very limited treatment options, with very few patients responding to standard chemotherapy. This study is aimed at attempting to prolong the response to conventional treatment using maintenance immunotherapy.
'Immune checkpoint inhibitors have now become the standard of care in a number of different solid tumours, but their role in ovarian cancer remains unclear. The exploratory element of this study will hopefully provide some insight into the ovarian tumour immune microenvironment, with the potential of identifying those patients who will benefit from immunotherapy’.
PROMPT would like to thank all the hospital teams involved in the set up and running of the study. PROMPT has funding support from Merck Sharp & Dohme Ltd.
Recruitment will continue until November 2020. Keep an eye on the CTC website for more details.