CITARELLA F.

Background: Patients with programmed cell death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) ≥50% metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (mNSCLC) and ECOG performance status (PS) of 2 treated with first-line immunotherapy have heterogeneous clinical assessment and outcomes. Methods: To explore the role of immune-inflammatory surrogates by the validated lung immuno-oncology...

Background: To stratify the prognosis of patients with programmed cell death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) ≥ 50% advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (aNSCLC) treated with first-line immunotherapy. Methods: Baseline clinical prognostic factors, the neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR), PD-L1 tumour cell expression level, lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) and their...

Introduction: Nearly 1% to 2% of NSCLCs harbor RET fusions. Characterization of this rare population is still incomplete. Methods: This retrospective multicenter study included patients with any-stage RET positive (RET+) NSCLC from 31 cancer centers. Molecular profiling included DNA/RNA sequencing or fluorescence in situ hybridization analyses....

BACKGROUND: The association between obesity and outcomes in patients receiving programmed death-1/programmed death ligand-1 (PD-L1) checkpoint inhibitors has already been confirmed in pre-treated non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients, regardless of PD-L1 tumor expression. METHODS: We present the outcomes analysis according to baseline...

Background: The favourable safety profile and the increasing confidence with immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) might have boosted their prescription in frail patients with short life expectancies, who usually are not treated with standard chemotherapy. Methods: The present analysis aims to describe clinicians' attitudes towards ICIs...

Background: Treatment sequencing with first-line immunotherapy, followed by second-line chemotherapy, is still a viable option for NSCLC patients with PD-L1 expression ≥50%. Methods: We evaluated post-progression treatment pathways in a large real-world cohort of metastatic NSCLC patients with PD-L1 expression ≥ 50% treated with first-line...

Background: We previously demonstrated the cumulative poor prognostic role of concomitant medications on the clinical outcome of patients with advanced cancer treated with immune checkpoint inhibitors, creating and validating a drug-based prognostic score to be calculated before immunotherapy initiation in patients with advanced solid tumours....

Introduction: COVID-19 has disrupted the global health care system since March 2020. Lung cancer (LC) patients (pts) represent a vulnerable population highly affected by the pandemic. This multicenter Italian study aimed to evaluate whether the COVID-19 outbreak had an impact on access to cancer diagnosis and treatment of LC pts compared with...

Background: The role of immune-related adverse events (irAEs), as a surrogate predictor of the efficacy of checkpoint inhibitors, has not yet been described in the setting of first-line, single-agent pembrolizumab for patients with metastatic non–small-cell lung-cancer (NSCLC) with a programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) expression of ≥ 50%....

Background: Single-agent pembrolizumab represents the standard first-line option for metastatic non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients with a PD-L1 (programmed death-ligand 1) expression of ≥ 50%. Methods: We conducted a multicenter retrospective study aimed at evaluating the clinicopathologic correlates of pembrolizumab effectiveness in...