Source: www.oncologypractice.com Author: Neil Osterweil, Oncology Report Digital Network The addition of the experimental targeted agent zalutumumab to primary curative chemoradiation for head and neck cancers did not improve locoregional control, disease-specific survival, or overall survival at 3 years of follow-up. The only thing that zalutumumab added to therapy was a skin rash in the large majority of patients who received it, reported Dr. Jens Overgaard, of the department of experimental clinical oncology at Aarhus University, Denmark. Response to zalutumumab, a monoclonal antibody targeted to the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR), was not related to tumor human papillomavirus 16 (HPV/p16) status or to chemoradiotherapy, Dr. Overgaard reported at the Multidisciplinary Head and Neck Cancer Symposium. The results of the DAHANCA 19 trial echo those of the RTOG (Radiation Oncology Therapy Group) trial 0522, which found no benefit from the addition of the EGFR inhibitor cetuximab (Erbitux) to accelerated cisplatin-based chemoradiotherapy, said Dr. Paul Harari, an invited discussant from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. "Where I think we have a lot of unanswered questions is acknowledging how little we actually understand about EGFR biology, despite now 40 years of progressive knowledge," Dr. Harari said. "We’re now seeing very clearly in molecular and clinical correlate studies that the more we suppress the EGFR, the more we see collateral overexpression of additional RTKs [receptor tyrosine kinases], including members of the HER family, such as HER-3, that enable an escape mechanism for tumors that become resistant to EGFR inhibition," he said. Dr. Overgaard and [...]