Peripheral blood lymphocytes differentiation patterns in responses / outcomes to immune checkpoint blockade therapies
Xiaoyue Du1, Shaodi Wen1, Run Shi2
1Department of Oncology, The Affiliated Cancer Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Jiangsu Cancer Hospital, Jiangsu Institute of Cancer Research, Nanjing, China.
Objectives:
Programmed Cell Death-1/ Programmed Death-ligand 1 (PD-1 / PD-L1) inhibitor therapies targeting immunocytes induce persistent tumor remission in various cancers. However, the appropriate biomarkers for the therapeutic efficacy of PD-L1 and PD-1 blockade remain elusive.
Materials And Methods:
For a comprehensive analysis of peri-treatment lymphocyte differentiation, in the current study, we enrolled 146 non-small cell lung cancer patients who received α-PD-1 therapies for exploring the peripheral blood lymphocyte differentiation pattern at baseline and post-treatment (dynamic changes) by flow cytometry.
Results:
At baseline, CD4+ / CD8+ T cell ratio predicts good responses and outcomes, but activated T cell and cytotoxic T cell counts predict poor responses and outcomes. And for dynamic changes, after 6 weeks of immune checkpoint blockade (ICB) treatment, compared with baseline level, the elevation of total T and B cell counts indicate poor responses, and total T and TH cell counts indicate poor prognosis while activated T cell predicts good prognosis. And after 12 weeks, elevated total lymphocyte, cytotoxic T cell counts, and decreased total T cell counts and CD4+ / CD8+ T cell ratio predict good responses / outcomes. Our clinical predicting model shows good performance in predicting ICB treatment responses / outcomes.
Conclusion:
Patients with favorable clinical responses / outcomes have distinctive peripheral blood immunocyte differentiation characteristics, indicating the potential of utilizing the peripheral immunocyte differentiation patterns for predicting ICB responses / outcomes.
