Evantumumab/Carestream is a targeted or immune drug

Many patients with non-small cell lung cancer often have questions when they first come into contact with amivantamab: Is it a targeted drug or an immunotherapy drug? From a medical professional perspective, evantumumab is not an immune checkpoint inhibitor in the traditional sense, but a targeted antibody drug with immune function properties.

The essence of evantumumab is a fully human bispecific monoclonal antibody. Its core mechanism of action is to simultaneously recognize and bind to two receptors: EGFR and MET. These two receptors play a key driving role in some non-small cell lung cancers, especially EGFR exon 20 insertion mutations. Therefore, from the perspective of its target, evantumumab has a very clear "targeting property", which is similar to that of small molecule EGFR-TKI.

But unlike traditional oral targeted drugs, evantumumab also has immune effects unique to antibody drugs. After binding to tumor cell surface receptors, it can recruit natural killer cells and macrophages in the immune system through the Fc fragment, inducing antibody-dependent cytotoxicity, thereby indirectly activating the body's anti-tumor immune response. Because of this, it is often classified as a "targeted antibody with immune-mediating effects" in overseas materials.

What needs to be distinguished in particular is that evantumumab does not work through thePD-1 or PD-L1 pathways, so there are significant differences from common immune checkpoint inhibitors in terms of applicable populations, side effects spectrum, and efficacy evaluation methods. This is why some patients with EGFR mutated lung cancer have limited benefit from immunotherapy, but may still get treatment opportunities from evantumumab.

From a patient's perspective, evantumumab can be regarded as an "upgraded version of targeted therapy" that has the dual characteristics of accurately attacking tumor signaling pathways and mobilizing the immune system. This unique positioning is also an important reason why it has received widespread attention in the field of treatment of EGFR mutant lung cancer.

Reference materials:https://www.rybrevant.com/