Lymphoma: Challenges and New Directions

This session will focus on challenges in the treatment of lymphoma and opportunities with the availability of novel therapies. R-CHOP is the standard therapy for Diffuse Large B cell Lymphoma and the majority of treated patients will attain a complete remission after receiving this regimen. However, some subtypes such as Activated B cell (ABC) type and double hit lymphoma have a lower response rate.

Dr. Coiffier will present an overview of options for patients who fail to respond to R-CHOP induction therapy. Primary CNS lymphoma is a rare lymphoma subtype and is a challenging entity as many chemotherapy agents with activity in lymphoma do not cross the blood-brain barrier.

Dr. Batchelor will present an overview of treatment options in this disease and he will also discuss management of CNS involvement in patients with lymphoma.

Finally the availability of checkpoint inhibitors has provided a new option for lymphoma therapy and Dr. Heslop will review current experience with these agents in lymphoma. She will also review adoptive T-cell studies that target tumor antigens through native T-cell receptors or engineered artificial T-cell receptors and discuss the potential for combination therapies.