Pertaining to metastatic prostate cancer, recently published data reported 8.1% of men with advanced prostate cancer had evidence of mismatch repair (MMR) mutations in their tumors. These types of mutations are frequently seen in tumors among Lynch syndrome patients. In addition, men with this type of tumor had much poorer survival. Tumors with MMR defects are thought to generate more antigens and be more responsive to a new class of drugs called immunotherapy. The researchers are now planning to conduct a new clinical trial to test the effectiveness of immunotherapy (through checkpoint inhibitors) in this group of patients with particularly aggressive prostate cancer. These advances serve to highlight some of the recent breakthroughs in the treatment of tumors among those with inherited cancer predisposition.
Nava Rodrigues D, et al. J Clin Invest. 2019 Oct 1. PMID: 30179225.