November 2023

UROLOGY

A SPATIAL COMPARISON OF MOLECULAR FEATURES ASSOCIATED WITH RESISTANCE TO PEMBROLIZUMAB IN BCG-UNRESPONSIVE BLADDER CANCER

Featuring: Joshua J. Meeks, MD, PhD, Bonnie Choy, MD

In a study published to medRxiv, investigators, including Joshua J. Meeks, MD, PhD, the Edward M. Schaeffer, MD, PhD, professor of Urology at Northwestern Medicine, and Bonnie Choy, MD, assistant professor of Genitourinary Pathology at Northwestern Medicine, aimed to assess the molecular features associated with response to pembrolizumab in BCG-unresponsive non-muscle invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) patients.

They used digital spatial profiling to analyze tumor samples before and after pembrolizumab treatment. They evaluated 119 regions of interest from five patients and found that responders had distinct expression signatures compared to non-responders in both the tumor and tumor microenvironment. Responders were more likely to have dynamic changes in gene expression after pembrolizumab treatment.
For the first time, the investigators identified specific gene expression patterns associated with response and resistance to pembrolizumab in NMIBCs.
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Read the full study. 
Joshua J. Meeks, MD, PhD, the Edward M. Schaeffer, MD, PhD, Professor of Urology and Associate Professor of Urology and of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics at Northwestern Medicine
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Bonnie Choy, MD, Assistant Professor of Genitourinary Pathology at Northwestern Medicine

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