Bispecifics and CAR T for Follicular Lymphoma: What Patients Should Know
What’s vital for follicular lymphoma patients to know about bispecific antibodies and CAR T? Expert Dr. Kami Maddocks from The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center discusses common follicular lymphoma treatment side effects for bispecifics and CAR T and how to help safeguard patients.
Download Guide | Descargar Guía
See More from START HERE Follicular Lymphoma
Related Resources:
Follicular Lymphoma Care: Bispecific Antibody Side Effects and Precautions |
|
Supporting Follicular Lymphoma Patients in Relapse: Expert Tips for Care Partners |
Transcript:
Lisa Hatfield:
What are the long-term side effects of bispecific antibody treatment, and how will I be monitored for them after treatment ends?
Dr. Kami Maddocks:
So another great question. I think, when we think about the side effects in general, the bispecific antibodies in the CAR T both have those unique toxicity, cytokine release being the most common. And then you also have worry about the neurological toxicity. The difference is that, depending on the specific, bispecific or CAR T that you use, but we usually, typically see these occur in lower grade or not as severe with a bispecific antibody than you can see with a CAR T-cell therapy. You can still have cytopenias and infection risk with these therapies.
Whereas in chemotherapy, we think of that as more generalized toxicities, with the cytopenias, with the risk of infection with the GI toxicities. When we think about long-term side effects, so I think one of the important things to recognize is that bispecific antibodies have not been around that long in the scheme of things, though we can’t say, the risk of 20 years, what do we see or even 10 years.
But when we think about what we have seen, we’ve seen things like the cytokine release, the infections, the cytopenias, but what we haven’t seen is things like the secondary malignancies that we worry about when we think about chemotherapy or even maybe immunomodulatory therapy or secondary cancers that patients can develop. I think for long-term monitoring, right now, at least the biggest thing you want to think about is that these therapies do deplete the lymphocytes, for a prolonged time. And so the risk of viral infections or reactivation of infections, and making sure that’s being considered.
