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PERTAIN met its primary PFS end point. Pertuzumab plus trastuzumab and an AI is effective for the treatment of HER2-positive MBC/LABC. The safety profile was consistent with previous trials of pertuzumab plus trastuzumab.

Background Trastuzumab deruxtecan (T-DXd) has shown durable antitumor activity in pretreated patients with HER2-positive advanced breast cancer (ABC), but its efficacy has not yet been evaluated in patients with active brain metastases (BMs). DEBBRAH aims to assess T-DXd in patients with HER2-positive or HER2-low ABC and central nervous system involvement. Methods This ongoing, five-cohort, phase II study (NCT04420598) enrolled patients with pretreated HER2-positive or HER2-low ABC with stable, untreated, or progressing BMs and/or leptomeningeal carcinomatosis. Here, we report findings from HER2-positive ABC patients with non-progressing BMs after local therapy (n=8; cohort 1), asymptomatic untreated BMs (n=4; cohort 2), or progressing BMs after local therapy (n=9; cohort 3). Patients received 5.4 mg/kg T-DXd intravenously once every 21 days. The primary endpoint was 16-week progression-free survival (PFS) for cohort 1 and intracranial overall response rate (ORR-IC) for cohorts 2 and 3. Results As of October 20, 2021, 21 patients received T-DXd. In cohort 1, 16-week PFS rate was 87.5% (95%CI, 47.3–99.7; P<.001). ORR-IC was 50.0% (95%CI, 6.7–93.2) in cohort 2 and 44.4% (95%CI, 13.7–78.8; P<.001) in cohort 3. Overall, the ORR-IC in patients with active BMs was 46.2% (95%CI, 19.2–74.9). Among patients with measurable intracranial or extracranial lesions at baseline, the ORR was 66.7% (12 out of 18 patients; 95%CI, 41.0–86.7), 80.0% (95%CI, 28.4–99.5) in cohort 1, 50.0% (95%CI, 6.7–93.2) in cohort 2, and 66.7% (95%CI, 29.9–92.5) in cohort 3. All responders had partial responses. The most common adverse events included fatigue (52.4%; 4.8% grade≥3), nausea (42.9%; 0% grade≥3), neutropenia (28.6%; 19% grade≥3), and constipation (28.6%; 0% grade≥3). Two (9.5%) patients suffered grade 1 interstitial lung disease/pneumonitis. Conclusions T-DXd showed intracranial activity with manageable toxicity and maintained quality of life in pretreated HER2-positive ABC patients with stable, untreated, or progressing BMs. Further studies are needed to validate these results in larger cohorts.

Background: Palbociclib plus endocrine therapy (ET) is the standard treatment of hormone receptor-positive and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2-negative, metastatic breast cancer (MBC). However, its efficacy has not been compared with that of chemotherapy in a phase III trial. Patients and methods: PEARL is a multicentre, phase III randomised study in which patients with aromatase inhibitor (AI)-resistant MBC were included in two consecutive cohorts. In cohort 1, patients were randomised 1 : 1 to palbociclib plus exemestane or capecitabine. On discovering new evidence about estrogen receptor-1 (ESR1) mutations inducing resistance to AIs, the trial was amended to include cohort 2, in which patients were randomised 1 : 1 between palbociclib plus fulvestrant and capecitabine. The stratification criteria were disease site, prior sensitivity to ET, prior chemotherapy for MBC, and country of origin. Co-primary endpoints were progression-free survival (PFS) in cohort 2 and in wild-type ESR1 patients (cohort 1 þ cohort 2). ESR1 hotspot mutations were analysed in baseline circulating tumour DNA.

From January 2020, COVID-19 is spreading around the world producing serious respiratory symptoms in infected patients that in some cases can be complicated by the severe acute respiratory syndrome, sepsis and septic shock, multiorgan failure, including acute kidney injury and cardiac injury. Cost and time efficient approaches to reduce the burthen of the disease are needed. To find potential COVID-19 treatments among the whole arsenal of existing drugs, we combined system biology and artificial intelligence-based approaches. The drug combination of pirfenidone and melatonin has been identified as a candidate treatment that may contribute to reduce the virus infection. Starting from different drug targets the effect of the drugs converges on human proteins with a known role in SARS-CoV-2 infection cycle. Simultaneously, GUILDify v2.0 web server has been used as an alternative method to corroborate the effect of pirfenidone and melatonin against the infection of SARS-CoV-2. We have also predicted a potential therapeutic effect of the drug combination over the respiratory associated pathology, thus tackling at the same time two important issues in COVID-19. These evidences, together with the fact that from a medical point of view both drugs are considered safe and can be combined with the current standard of care treatments for COVID-19 makes this combination very attractive for treating patients at stage II, nonsevere symptomatic patients with the presence of virus and those patients who are at risk of developing severe pulmonary complications.

Background: The potential benefit of adding palbociclib to fulvestrant as first-line treatment in hormone receptor (HR)-positive, human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-negative endocrine-sensitive advanced breast cancer (ABC) patients remains uncharacterized. Patients and methods: In this randomized (1:1), double-blind, phase II study, postmenopausal women with HR-positive, HER2-negative ABC with de novo metastatic disease or those who relapsed after >12 months of adjuvant endocrine therapy received palbociclib/fulvestrant or placebo/fulvestrant. Stratification was based on recurrent versus de novo metastatic disease and visceral involvement. The primary objective was one-year progression-free survival (PFS-1y) rate. The sample size was 190 patients. The two-sided alpha of 0.2, 80% of power to detect a difference between the arms, assuming PFS rates of 0.695 and 0.545 for palbociclib/fulvestrant and placebo/fulvestrant, respectively. Results: In total, 189 patients were randomized to palbociclib/fulvestrant ([n Z 94] or placebo/ fulvestrant [n Z 95]). 45.5% and 60.3% of patients had de novo metastatic disease and visceral involvement, respectively. PFS-1y rates were 83.5% and 71.9% in the palbociclib/fulvestrant and placebo/fulvestrant arms, (HR 0.55, 80% CI 0.36e0.83, P Z 0.064). The median PFS were 31.8 and 22.0 months for the palbociclib/fulvestrant and placebo/fulvestrant arms (aHR 0.48, 80% CI 0.37e0.64, P Z 0.001).The most frequent grade 3e4 adverse events were neutropenia (68.1% vs. 0%), leucopenia (26.6% vs. 0%), anemia (3.2% vs. 0%), and lymphopenia (14.9% vs. 2.1%) for the palbociclib/fulvestrant and placebo/fulvestrant, respectively. The most frequent non-hematologic grade 3e4 adverse event was fatigue (4.3% vs. 0%). Conclusions: Palbociclib/fulvestrant demonstrated better PFS-1y rates and median PFS than placebo/fulvestrant in HR-positive/HER2-negative endocrine-sensitive ABC patients.

Background. In the neoadjuvant setting, changes in the proliferation marker Ki67 are associated with primary endocrine treatment efficacy, but its value as a predictor of response to chemotherapy is still controversial. Patients and Methods. We analyzed 262 patients with centralized basal Ki67 immunohistochemical evaluation derived from 4 GEICAM (Spanish Breast Cancer Group) clinicaltrialsofneoadjuvant chemotherapy for breast cancer. The objective was to identify the optimal threshold for Ki67 using the receiver-operating characteristic curve method to maximize its predictive value for chemotherapy benefit. We also evaluated the predictive role of the defined Ki67 cutoffs for molecular subtypes defined by estrogen receptor (ER) and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2). Results. A basal Ki67 cutpoint of 50% predicted pathological complete response (pCR). Patients with Ki67 .50% achieved a