Immunotherapy in Colon Cancer - Digesting the Facts

Colon cancer remains one of the leading causes of cancer-related death in the Western world despite an extensive understanding of the molecular underpinnings of the disease and the availability of numerous therapeutic options.

Novel treatment modalities that overcome this limitation are needed. Immunotherapy, in which a patient’s immune system is harnessed to destroy existing and nascent tumors, has shown broad utility across numerous tumor types, including melanoma and NSCLC.

High mutation burden and/or mismatch repair gene deficiencies are now employed as biomarkers for evaluating whether a tumor may be susceptible to intervention with immune checkpoint inhibitors such as PD1, PD-L1, and CTLA4. This case study reviews the pathways that can be evaluated using various Immunotherapy treatment options in Colon Cancer.