The industry sponsored symposium “Strategies for Chemotherapy-Induced Side-Effect Management: Preventing CIPN with Cryotherapy” held on Monday 20^th October in front of 200 in-person delegates, was also streamed live to 30,000 delegates at the congress.

Chaired by Mary Tanay, RN, PhDa Consultant Nurse in Genomics at Berkshire Cancer Centre - Royal Berkshire NHS Trust and Visiting Lecturer at the Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing, Midwifery and Palliative Care, King’s College London. Mary was joined by Elahe Salehi, DNP, ANP-BC, Nurse Practitioner at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute who spoke about  ‘The prevalence and impact of CIPN on the outcome of cancer patients’; Maryam Lustberg, MD, MPH, Director Breast Center/Chief Breast Oncology at Yale University School of Medicine presented ‘Current strategies in clinical practice to support and advocate for patients experiencing CIPN’. The session concluded with Hope Rugo, MD, Division Chief of Breast Medical Oncology and a Professor of Medical Oncology and Therapeutics Research at City of Hope Comprehensive Cancer Center, presenting, ‘Review the development of new medical devices for the management of CIPN in chemotherapy settings’.

Dr Hope Rugo presented the latest data from the Phase II study in Singapore. This Single-arm phase I-II study across multiple sites in Singapore evaluates the safety and efficacy of a novel wearable limb cryocompression device. The optimal ‘dose’ (optimal temperature of 11°C and pressure 5-15mmHg) was based on results from our prior pilot study. In this latest data release 94 patients were involved in the study and 84% (79/94) of patients completed all planned treatments with cryo-compression meaning limb cooling was well tolerated at 11°C and concomitant scalp cooling did not affect tolerance of cryo-compression (p=0.181). 

Using physician assessed CIPN Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE) grading at the end of treatment, 75.9% (60/79) of patients did not experience CIPN, 21.5% (17/79) had Grade 1 CIPN and 2.5% (2/79) had Grade 2 CIPN. 2 patients with Grade 1 neuropathy pre-treatment remained stable. Patient Assessed European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) QLQ CIPN-20 Score, a questionnaire developed to assess the quality of life of cancer patients, showed about 15% of patients reported clinically significant CIPN, defined as an increase of ≥3 points or more on the EORTC QLQ-CIPN 20 sensory neuropathy subscale. Concluding that the use of limb cryocompression is safe and well-tolerated in patients receiving taxane-based chemotherapy, can be safely administered with concomitant scalp cooling therapy and shows promising data in reducing the rates of taxane-based CIPN compared to historical data.

Rachel Wong Su Jen, Medical Oncology Consultant, at the National University Cancer Institute, Singapore said,
“CIPN remains one of the most challenging and persistent side effects of cancer treatment experienced by patients. We are proud to contribute to advancing research in this important area of supportive care and are encouraged by the promising results emerging from our phase I-II study.”

“We were delighted to be joined by these four influential speakers at EONS18/ESMO this year to highlight the importance of preventing chemotherapy induced peripheral neuropathy,” Richard Paxman, CEO commented.
“This most up-to-date data from our ongoing study in Singapore with our partners at the National University of Singapore was exciting to share. Looking at historical data just in the weekly taxane setting where we would typically see up to 30% grade 2 CIPN compared to our study showing only 2.5% this gives me confidence in our approach. We must continue to make progress to ensure this intervention can be accessed by patients around the world, reducing the risk of this debilitating side effect. We are grateful to our partners in Singapore and would also like to thank our speakers for joining us in Berlin.”

As well as the ongoing Singapore study, the multi-center three-arm randomized controlled study in the United States of America continues, which is supported by the National Cancer Institute together with cooperative research group (SWOG). Furthermore, also in the United States of America, a randomized controlled trial has recently opened with the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, Boston.