Assessment of the Safety of Pembrolizumab in Patients With HIV and Advanced Cancer-A Phase 1 Study.

Importance: Anti-PD-1 (anti-programmed cell death 1) and anti-PD-L1 (anti-programmed cell death ligand 1) regimens are preferred therapies for many cancers, including cancers associated with HIV. However, patients with HIV were excluded from most registered trials.

Objective: The primary objective was to evaluate the safety of pembrolizumab in people with HIV and advanced cancer; the secondary objective was to evaluate tumor responses.

Durable Tumor Regression and Overall Survival in Patients With Advanced Merkel Cell Carcinoma Receiving Pembrolizumab as First-Line Therapy.

Purpose: Merkel cell carcinoma (MCC) is an aggressive skin cancer often caused by the Merkel cell polyomavirus. Clinical trials of programmed cell death-1 pathway inhibitors for advanced MCC (aMCC) demonstrate increased progression-free survival (PFS) compared with historical chemotherapy data. However, response durability and overall survival (OS) data are limited.

Tuberculosis following PD-1 blockade for cancer immunotherapy.

Because of the well-established therapeutic benefit of boosting antitumor responses through blockade of the T cell inhibitory receptor PD-1, it has been proposed that PD-1 blockade could also be useful in infectious disease settings, including (Mtb) infection. However, in preclinical models, Mtb-infected PD-1 mice mount exaggerated T1 responses that drive lethal immunopathology. Multiple cases of tuberculosis during PD-1 blockade have been observed in patients with cancer, but in humans little is understood about Mtb-specific immune responses during checkpoint blockade-associated tuberculosis.