UC San Diego

As an exceedingly recalcitrant and highly aggressive tumor type without Food and Drug Administration-approved treatment or a known cure, the prognosis of recurrent extensive stage platinum-resistant/refractory small cell lung cancer (SCLC) is worse than other types of lung cancer, and many other tumor types, given a response rate of less than 10% and an overall survival of less than six months. It was broadly classified into three groups based on the initial response to cisplatin/etoposide therapy, platinum-refractory, platinum-resistant, and platinum-sensitive, extensive stage SCLC inevitably relapses, at which point the only standard options are to rechallenge with the first-line chemotherapeutic regimen in the case of sensitive disease or to start the topoisomerase I inhibitor, topotecan. Sensitive disease is defined by a response to the first-line therapy and a treatment-free interval of at least 90 days, while the definitions of refractory and resistant disease, respectively, are nonresponse to the first-line treatment or relapse within 90 days. As an important predictor of response to the second-line treatment, the clinical cutoff of three months (or two months in some cases) for resistant and sensitive disease, which along with performance status prognostically separates patients into high- and low-risk categories, dictates subsequent management. This case report presents a resistant SCLC patient enrolled on a Phase II clinical trial called QUADRUPLE THREAT (formerly TRIPLE THREAT; NCT02489903) who responded to reintroduced platinum doublets after sequential priming with the resistance-reversing epi-immunotherapeutic agent, RRx-001. In the QUADRUPLE THREAT clinical trial, both during priming with RRx-001 and during sequential treatment with platinum doublets, the patient maintained a good quality of life and performance status.