On March 5, 2020 Idera Pharmaceuticals, Inc. ("Idera" or "the company") (NASDAQ: IDRA) reported completion of patient enrollment into ILLUMINATE-301, its registrational trial of tilsotolimod in combination with ipilimumab in patients with anti-PD-1 refractory advanced melanoma (Press release, Idera Pharmaceuticals, MAR 5, 2020, View Source [SID1234555198]). The company expects to announce top-line overall response rate (ORR) and other preliminary data from ILLUMINATE-301 in Q1 2021.
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"We are making outstanding progress in moving toward our goal of delivering tilsotolimod to the market in our lead indication for anti-PD-1 refractory advanced melanoma patients," stated Vincent Milano, Idera’s Chief Executive Officer. "We achieved this critical milestone earlier than anticipated, which we believe is truly a testament to the high unmet need facing these patients."
Added Elizabeth Tarka, M.D., Idera’s Chief Medical Officer, "We believe tilsotolimod in combination with ipilimumab may be an important new therapeutic option for these patients, and we are incredibly grateful to them, their families, and our investigators for their participation in ILLUMINATE-301. We look forward to sharing the results of this exciting trial soon."
ILLUMINATE-301 is a randomized, phase 3 trial comparing the effectiveness of intratumoral tilsotolimod in combination with ipilimumab with ipilimumab alone in patients with anti-PD-1 refractory advanced melanoma, with a primary endpoint family of ORR per RECIST v1.1 and overall survival (OS). Key secondary endpoints include durable response rate, time to response, progression-free survival, patient-reported outcomes, and safety. ILLUMINATE-301 enrolled 481 patients across 80 sites in 11 countries.
About Anti-PD-1 Refractory Advanced Melanoma
Melanoma is a cancer that begins in a type of skin cell called melanocytes. While melanoma is one of the least common types of skin cancer, it has a poor prognosis when not detected and treated early. As is the case in many forms of cancer, melanoma becomes more difficult to treat once the disease has spread, or metastasized, beyond the skin to other parts of the body. According to the American Cancer Society, approximately 100,000 people in the US will be diagnosed with invasive melanoma this year. In recent years, pioneering immunotherapies known as checkpoint inhibitors (CPIs) have changed the treatment of advanced melanoma and have become the standard of care, with anti-PD-1 agents being the most commonly used immunotherapy in the first-line setting. These agents work by increasing the ability of the body’s immune system to help detect and fight cancer cells. However, due to primary or acquired resistance mechanisms that exclude or inhibit anti-tumor immune cells, as many as 60% of patients do not benefit from this type of therapy, and up to one-third of initial responders develop resistance to the therapy and ultimately experience disease progression. Today, these refractory patients are left with few options for further treatment, paving the way for novel investigational therapies such as tilsotolimod.
About Tilsotolimod (IMO-2125)
Tilsotolimod is an investigational, synthetic Toll-like receptor 9 agonist. Intratumoral injection of tilsotolimod has been shown to promote both innate (Type-I IFN, antigen presentation) and adaptive (T cells) immune activation. Tumors with an active immune response appear to respond better to CPIs than those that exclude or inhibit anti-tumor immune cells. Thus, tilsotolimod in combination with CPIs may cause regression of locally injected and distant tumor lesions and increase the number of patients who benefit from immunotherapy.
Tilsotolimod has received both Fast Track designation and Orphan Drug designation from the FDA and is being evaluated in multiple tumor types and in combination with multiple checkpoint inhibitors. For more information on tilsotolimod trials, please visit www.clinicaltrials.gov.