New Advances in Supportive Care: Chemoprotective Agents as Novel Opportunities in Geriatric Oncology

To explore the effectiveness of trilaciclib and ALRN-6924 in the prevention of cancer chemotherapy-induced toxicity in older patients. New chemoprotective agents are necessary because age is the main risk factor for chemotherapy complications that account largely for the poorer outcome of cancer in the elderly. Trilaciclib and ALRN-6924 cause a reversible block of the proliferation of normal cells through cell cycle arrest (CCA). With this mechanism, they may prevent the toxicity of cycle-active cancer treatment including neutropenia, anemia, thrombocytopenia, lymphopenia, mucositis, and alopecia.

Myelopoietic growth factors may prevent neutropenia in the aged, but they may cause severe bone pain, may aggravate thrombocytopenia and anemia, and may cause myelodysplasia and acute leukemia as a late complication. The prevention of thrombocytopenia, anemia, mucositis, and alopecia is unsatisfactory at present. These complications may jeopardize the treatment outcome as they require a reduction of treatment dose/intensity and because many patients find the resulting symptoms intolerable. In three studies of patients with extensive disease small cell lung cancer (ES-SCLC), trilaciclib reduced the severity and duration of neutropenia and thrombocytopenia as well as the need for blood transfusions. In addition, it produced a significant expansion of T-cell clones. Trilaciclib received FDA approval for the prevention of chemotherapy-induced myelosuppression in patients with ES-SCLC. ALRN-6924 is currently studied in phase II study of ES-SCLC. In a phase IB of 38 patients, ALRN-6924 prevented myelosuppression to an extent comparable with trilaciclib. Both drugs proved as effective in patients 65 and older as they were in the younger ones. In an “ex vivo” study, ALRN-6924 protected the epithelial stem cells of hair follicles from taxanes and promised to prevent alopecia. The possibility that CCA of tumor cells may reduce the effectiveness of cycle-active chemotherapy is a major concern. For this reason, the use of trilaciclib, an inhibitor of CDK 4/6, should be limited to tumors with inactivated RB1, and the use of ALRN-6924, an inhibitor of P53, should be limited to tumors with inactivated P53.

Chemotherapy-related toxicities limit dose intensity and contribute to significant morbidity and mortality in elderly cancer patients. Trilaciclib and ALRN-6924 are of particular interest to geriatric oncologists because of their novel mechanism of action. Ameliorating chemotherapy-induced toxicities holds the promise of transforming the practice of geriatric oncology by enabling chemotherapeutic regimens that are currently not feasible for this patient population. Specifically, these agents may prevent chemotherapy-induced neutropenia and thrombocytopenia, perhaps the most life-threatening complications of cytotoxic chemotherapy, thereby obviating the need for the use of rescue strategies such as hematopoietic growth factors. In addition, these agents offer the potential for broad tissue protection from other chemotherapy-related toxicities, including mucositis, diarrhea, and alopecia, which historically have been poorly managed. Importantly, by preventing a spectrum of chemotherapy-related toxicities, these agents may permit the administration of chemotherapy at full-dose intensity, prevent functional decline, and grant maintenance of resilience to older cancer patients. As a result, the successful prevention of chemotherapy-induced side effects may not only mitigate the costs of care but also improve patient outcomes and quality of life. Finally, chemoprotective strategies offer the opportunity to apply geriatric principles to clinical trials of cancer treatment. In particular, they may allow the testing of prolongation of “active life expectancy” as a major goal of clinical trials in elderly patients. They may also enable novel and more practical forms of clinical trials. By assessing the risk of chemotherapy-related toxicity with the Chemotherapy Risk Assessment Scale for High Age Patients (CRASH) or the Cancer and Aging Research Group (CARG) instruments, these agents may permit researchers to utilize patients as their own controls and endorse the approval of supportive care drugs based upon the risk profile of individual patients.