Introduction: Lung cancer remains the most common malignancy and the leading cancer-related death among the elderly in China, which deserves more research attention. Immunotherapy combined with platinum-based doublet chemotherapy has been approved as the standard treatment for advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients who are devoid of specific gene mutations or fusions. Given that patients with NSCLC over the age of 65 typically exhibit declining organ function and physical condition, they often showed reduced tolerance for this rigorous treatment regimen. However, the KEYNOTE-042 study illuminated a promising pathway: in patients testing positive for programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1), immunotherapy alone has demonstrated a superior overall survival (OS) compared to platinum-based doublet chemotherapy. This suggests that moderating the intensity of chemotherapy and prioritizing immunotherapy may be a gentler alternative in elderly demographic.
Patients and methods: This multicenter phase II clinical trial named UNICORN aimed to enroll 49 patients aged 65 and older, utilizing paclitaxel or nab-paclitaxel for those with squamous NSCLC, and pemetrexed for those diagnosed with lung adenocarcinoma. The treatment protocol entails 4 cycles of serplulimab plus chemotherapy followed by an extended regimen of serplulimab maintenance, spanning a total of 35 cycles. Primary endpoints of this study are progression-free survival (PFS), disease control rate (DCR) and the secondary endpoints are OS, objective control rate (ORR) and safety metrics.
Conclusion: This is the first study to evaluate the efficacy and safety of serplulimab combined with either paclitaxel or pemetrexed in elderly treatment-naïve patients with stage IV NSCLC whose PD-L1 are positive.
Keywords: Elderly cancer patients; NSCLC; Serplulimab; Single-drug chemotherapy; StageⅣ.
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