Efficacy of Toripalimab

Toripalimab (Toripalimab) is effective when used alone or in combination with radiation therapy to treat patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC). In POLARIS-02/NCT02915432, 190 patients with treated recurrent or metastatic nasopharyngeal carcinoma received 3 mg/kg toripalimab by intravenous infusion every two weeks until disease progression, unacceptable toxicity, or voluntary discontinuation.

The objective response rate (ORR) of toripalimab monotherapy was 20.5% and the disease control rate (DCR) was 41.6%, which ledtoripalimabto be approved as a third-line therapy for the treatment of patients with recurrent/metastatic (R/R) nasopharyngeal carcinoma. Intensity-modulated radiotherapy is the most widely used radiotherapy technique for nasopharyngeal cancer and can significantly improve patient survival rates. In a phase II trial of patients with recurrent nasopharyngeal carcinoma, toripalimab was prescribed in combination with intensity-modulated radiotherapy, achieving an ORR of 79.2% and a DCR of 95.8%, resulting in one treatment-related death.

In patients with nasopharyngeal carcinoma, toripalimab combined with chemotherapy showed superior clinical benefit compared with chemotherapy alone. Gemcitabine-cisplatin (GP)is the standard first-line chemotherapy regimen for advanced or metastatic NPC. Recently, the phase 3 study JUPITOR-02 was published, providing a head-to-head comparison of toripalimab plus GP and placebo plus GP. The study involved 289 patients with recurrent or metastatic toripalimab and no prior chemotherapy. Patients were randomized to receive toripalimab plus GP (combination group) or placebo plus GP (placebo group); compared with the placebo group, the combination group had longer progression-free survival (PFS) and a stratified HR for overall survival (OS) of 0.78.