Abstract
Metastatic bladder cancer is an aggressive malignancy with a poor prognosis when presenting with advanced stage. Cisplatin-based therapy has been the mainstay of first-line treatment but therapy in second-line setting has been an unmet medical need for decades. Moreover, many patients are unable to receive cisplatin-based therapy. Recently, immune-checkpoint inhibitors transformed the management and prognosis of many malignancies and will certainly redefine the standard of care for bladder cancer. Atezolizumab, an anti-PD-L1 antibody, was the first immune-checkpoint inhibitor to be approved by the US FDA in May 2016 for patients with urothelial carcinoma. In this review, we discuss the evidence behind this promising drug.
Financial & competing interests disclosure
Y Loriot is on the advisory board for Janssen, Astelas, MSD, Roche, AstraZeneca, Ipsen, Pfizer and Sanofi. The authors have no other relevant affiliations or financial involvement with any organization or entity with a financial interest in or financial conflict with the subject matter or materials discussed in the manuscript apart from those disclosed.
No writing assistance was utilized in the production of this manuscript.
Company review
In addition to the peer-review process, with the authors’ consent, the manufacturer of the product discussed in this article was given the opportunity to review the manuscript for factual accuracy. Changes were made by the authors at their discretion and based on scientific or editorial merit only. The authors maintained full control over the manuscript, including content, wording and conclusions.