The second trial, called EV-302, compared the enfortumab –pembrolizumab combination with a standard chemotherapy regimen. In the first trial, known as CheckMate-901, patients received standard chemotherapy for advanced bladder cancer, either alone or in combination with the immunotherapy drug nivolumab (Opdivo), as initial treatment for advanced bladder cancer.
Both studies included people whose bladder cancer had spread to other parts of the body or could not be removed by surgery, and both studies involved immunotherapy drugs. The findings mark a pivotal moment following years of little progress, according to several leading bladder cancer experts. One treatment-the combination of enfortumab vedotin (Padcev) and the immunotherapy drug pembrolizumab (Keytruda)-proved to be particularly powerful.
For the first time in decades, people with advanced bladder cancer have more effective treatment options, according to results of two large clinical trials.
