Thorac Cancer 2020 Feb 11

The role of IL-6 in immunotherapy of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with immune-related adverse events (irAEs).

Abstract

IL-6 is a cytokine that plays an important role in response to injury or infection and is a promising biomarker for predicting poor prognosis and therapeutic targets in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). This article reviews the biochemical mechanism, function and genotype of IL-6, and summarizes the diagnostic and prognostic value of IL-6 level. Anti-IL-6 therapy does not affect the effect of immunocheckpoint inhibitors (ICIs), but enhances its anticancer function, which may be the treatment option for immune-related adverse events (irAEs) in the future. Therefore, IL-6 may be a therapeutic target for the treatment of NSCLC.

Related Questions

Is IL-6 inhibition an option in patients who are going to be rechallenged with checkpoint inhibitors after previously developing ICI-mediated temporal arteritis?

2 Answers

Mednet Member

Rheumatology · Johns Hopkins School of Medicine

There are reports of using IL-6R inhibition in combination with checkpoint inhibitor therapy in other scenarios (e.g. inflammatory arthritis, cytokine release syndrome). So this would be a reasonable consideration if the oncologist feels strongly that further ICI therapy is beneficial.