Evaluation of a New Anti-cancer Immunotherapy in Patients With Non-operable and Progressing Metastatic Cutaneous Melanoma

Severe toxicity was defined, according to the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE) (version 4.0), as 1)an Antigen-Specific Cancer Immunotherapeutic (ASCI) related or possibly related Grade 3 or higher toxicity. Grade 3 myalgia, arthralgia, headache, fever, rigors/chills and fatigue (including lethargy, malaise and asthenia) should persist for 48 hours despite therapy to be taken into account and as 2)an ASCI related or possibly related Grade 2 or higher allergic reaction occurring within 24 hours of the dose administration.

Severe toxicity was defined, according to the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE) (version 4.0), as 1)an Antigen-Specific Cancer Immunotherapeutic (ASCI) related or possibly related Grade 3 or higher toxicity. Grade 3 myalgia, arthralgia, headache, fever, rigors/chills and fatigue (including lethargy, malaise and asthenia) should persist for 48 hours despite therapy in order to be taken into account and as 2)an ASCI related or possibly related Grade 2 or higher allergic reaction occurring within 24 hours of the dose administration. All active follow-up visits and procedures were stopped, hence this follow-up analysis was not performed as initially planned.

Best response was recorded from the start of treatment until disease progression. Response assessment was essentially based on a set of measurable lesions (target lesions [TL]), and any other lesions (non-target lesions [NTL]), both identified at baseline. Complete Response (CR)=disappearance of all TL or NTL; Partial Response (PR) = at least 30 percent (%) decrease in the sum of the longest diameter(LD) of TL compared to baseline, stable disease (SD) = neither sufficient shrinkage to qualify PR nor sufficient increase to qualify for Progressive disease (PD) compared with baseline; PD = at least 20% increase in the sum of LD of TL compared with baseline, or the appearance of one or more new lesions, or both of these, and/or unequivocal progression of existing NTL; NE =non-evaluable; Clinical response: any CR or PR best overall response; Disease control: any CR, PR, SD or SD/PR best overall response.

Patients with Slow Progressive Disease (SPD) status met the following criteria: patient's Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) performance status was 0 or 1, patient's lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) value was not greater than twice the normal upper limit, there was no appearance of visceral metastases other than in the lung, patients did not meet any of the criteria for permanent stopping of study treatment. Mixed response (MxR) criteria was defined as follows: at least 30% decrease in the longest diameter (LD) occurring in at least one target lesion recorded and measured at baseline. Such response occurring in otherwise stable disease (SD) or progressive disease (PD) status of LD of target lesions and without the appearance of one or more new lesions were classified as "SD with target lesion regression" or "PD with target lesion regression". The appearance of new lesions in otherwise partial response (PR) status of the LD of target lesions were classified as "PR with new lesion".

Following MAGE3-AS15-NSC-003 (ADJ) (NCT00480025) study (A double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled Phase III study to assess the efficacy of recMAGE-A3 + AS15 Antigen-Specific Cancer immunotherapeutic as adjuvant therapy in patients with resected MAGE-A3-positive Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer) showed the absence of treatment effect in any of the primary, secondary, or exploratory analyses, clinical activity was not reported within the population of patients who present the predictive MAGE-A3 gene signature, in that study.

An AE is any untoward medical occurrence in a clinical investigation patient, temporally associated with the use of a medical product, whether or not considered related to the medicinal product. An AE can be any unfavorable and unintended sign (including an abnormal laboratory finding), symptom, or disease (new or exacerbated) temporally associated with the use of a medicinal product. For marketed medicinal products, this also includes failure to produce expected benefits (i.e. lack efficacy), abuse or misuse.

An AE is any untoward medical occurrence in a clinical investigation patient, temporally associated with the use of a medical product, whether or not considered related to the medicinal product. An AE can be any unfavorable and unintended sign (including an abnormal laboratory finding), symptom, or disease (new or exacerbated) temporally associated with the use of a medicinal product. For marketed medicinal products, this also includes failure to produce expected benefits (i.e. lack efficacy), abuse or misuse.

A serious adverse event (SAE) is any untoward medical occurrence that results in death, is life-threatening, requires hospitalization or prolongation of existing hospitalization, results in disability/incapacity, is a congenital anomaly/birth defect in the offspring of a study patient, is a grade 4 AE according to the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE, v 4.0), in addition, in this study, Grade 3 or higher pIMDs were considered as medically significant and were therefore notified as SAE.

A serious adverse event (SAE) is any untoward medical occurrence that results in death, is life-threatening, requires hospitalization or prolongation of existing hospitalization, results in disability/incapacity, is a congenital anomaly/birth defect in the offspring of a study patient, is a grade 4 AE according to the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE, v 4.0), in addition, in this study, Grade 3 or higher pIMDs will be considered as medically significant and will therefore be notified as SAE. No serious adverse events were reported during the study period that are causally related to treatment administration by maximum grade.

Time to Treatment Failure (TTF) was defined as the time from first treatment until the date of the last treatment administration, for patients who discontinued the treatment prematurely, regardless of the reason for study treatment discontinuation. Patients who completed their full treatment phase or who were still on treatment at the time of analysis were censored on their last study treatment administration date..

Progression-free survival (PFS) was defined as the time from first treatment to either the date of first disease progression (PD) or the date of death (for whatever reason), whichever came first. Patients alive and without disease progression were censored at the date of the last visit/contact.

Overall survival (OS) was defined as the time from first treatment until death. Patients alive at the time of analysis were censored at the time of last visit/contact.

The duration of response was measured from the time when the measurement criteria for CR/PR (whichever was recorded first) or SD evaluation were met until the first date that first PD or death was objectively documented (taking as reference for PD the smallest measurements recorded since the treatment started). Stable disease (SD) was defined as neither sufficient shrinkage to qualify for PR nor sufficient increase to qualify for PD taking as references the sum of LD of target lesions recorded previously but not necessarily at baseline (The minimal time interval required between two measurements for determination of SD was at least 16 weeks.). The analysis was not performed as initially planned.

Progression-free survival was defined as the time from the date of registration of the patient to either the date of disease progression or the date of death (for whatever reason), whichever came first. Patients alive and without disease progression were censored at the date of their last tumor evaluation. PFS events included progressive disease (PD), death in absence of PD and events (Any event which was part of the natural course of the disease under study, was captured as an efficacy measure. Therefore it did not need to be reported as an SAE).

Summary of deaths included death, autopsy performed and cause of death. Progression of the tumor was recorded in the clinical assessments. Death due to progressive disease was to be recorded on a specific form in the case report form but not as a serious adverse event (SAE). However, if the investigator considered that there was a causal relationship between the administration of the treatment or protocol design/procedures and the disease progression, then this must be reported as an SAE.

Anti-NY-ESO-1 antibody concentrations were presented as geometric mean concentrations (GMTs) and expressed in enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) units per milliliter (EL.U/mL).

Anti NY-ESO-1 antibody response was defined as: For initially seronegative patients: post-vaccination antibody concentration greater than or equal to (≥) 179 EU/mL and for intially seropositive patients: post-vaccination antibody concentration ≥ 2 fold the pre-vaccination antibody concentration.

Cellular (T-cell) response was not analysed as data only available for few patients.