Complete remission in a pretreated, microsatellite-stable, KRAS-mutated colon cancer patient after treatment with sintilimab and bevacizumab and platinum-based chemotherapy: a case report and literature review

Front Immunol. 2024 Mar 28:15:1354613. doi: 10.3389/fimmu.2024.1354613. eCollection 2024.

Abstract

Metastatic colon cancer remains an incurable disease, and it is difficult for existing treatments to achieve the desired clinical outcome, especially for colon cancer patients who have received first-line treatment. Although immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) have demonstrated durable clinical efficacy in a variety of solid tumors, their response requires an inflammatory tumor microenvironment. However, microsatellite-stable (MSS) colon cancer, which accounts for the majority of colorectal cancers, is a cold tumor that does not respond well to ICIs. Combination regimens open the door to the utility of ICIs in cold tumors. Although combination therapies have shown their advantage even for MSS colon cancer, it remains unclear whether combination therapies show their advantage in patients with pretreated metastatic colon cancer. We report a patient who has achieved complete remission and good tolerance with sintilimab plus bevacizumab and platinum-based chemotherapy after postoperative recurrence. The patient had KRAS mutation and MSS-type colon cancer, and his PD-1+CD8+ and CD3-CD19-CD14+CD16-HLA-DR were both positive. He has achieved a progression-free survival of 43 months and is still being followed up at our center. The above results suggest that this therapeutic regimen is a promising treatment modality for the management of pretreated, MSS-type and KRAS-mutated metastatic colorectal cancer although its application to the general public still needs to be validated in clinical trials.

Keywords: KRAS mutation; MSS; bevacizumab; colon cancer; immunotherapy; metastasis; recurrence; sintilimab.

Publication types

  • Review
  • Case Reports
  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Antibodies, Monoclonal, Humanized*
  • Bevacizumab / therapeutic use
  • Colonic Neoplasms* / drug therapy
  • Colonic Neoplasms* / genetics
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Microsatellite Repeats
  • Pathologic Complete Response
  • Platinum
  • Proto-Oncogene Proteins p21(ras)* / genetics
  • Tumor Microenvironment

Substances

  • sintilimab
  • Bevacizumab
  • Proto-Oncogene Proteins p21(ras)
  • Platinum
  • KRAS protein, human
  • Antibodies, Monoclonal, Humanized

Grants and funding

The author(s) declare financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (82160129); Key Talents Project of Gansu Province (2019RCXM020); Key Project of Science and Technology in Gansu province (22ZD6FA054); Science and Technology Project of Chengguan District of Lanzhou City (2020SHFZ0039); Science and Technology Project of Chengguan District of Lanzhou City (2020JSCX0073); Medical Innovation and Development Project of Lanzhou University (lzuyxcx-2022-160); Medical Innovation and Development Project of Lanzhou University (lzuyxcx-2022-45); Medical Innovation and Development Project of Lanzhou University (lzuyxcx-2022-88); Gansu Province Innovation Driven Assistance Project (GXH20230817-14); Cuiying Scientific and Technological Innovation Program of Lanzhou University Second Hospital (CY2023-ZD-01).