Racial, Socioeconomic Disparities in Patients With NSCLC Treated With Immunotherapy

Evidence has shown that Black and/or socioeconomically disadvantaged patients with advanced NSCLC have higher mortality rates than patients who are not Black and/or socioeconomically disadvantaged. Results of a study that evaluated all-cause mortality by race and area deprivation index (ADI), a measurement of socioeconomic advantage, in a real-world NSCLC cohort treated with US Food and Drug Administration-approved immunotherapy (IO) in the first-line setting were presented at the 2023 North America Conference on Lung Cancer.

The retrospective analysis included 189 patients with NSCLC who received xT genomic profiling prior to treatment with IO and had a PD-L1 tumor proportion score ³1% and/or tumor mutational burden result ³10. The researchers analyzed two predictor variables: race (Black vs non-Black) and ADI, with ADI-L translating to an ADI <57 (the median in the dataset) and ADI-H to an ADI ³57, with ADI-L representing higher socioeconomic advantage.

Results showed the cohort consisted of 22 (11.6%) Black and 167 (88.4%) non-Black patients, and among the total, 123 patients had ADI data. Although demographic and clinical characteristics were well balanced, Black patients had a higher median ADI than non-Black patients (ADI, 73 vs 51; P=.002). Univariate analyses, however, showed no statistically significant differences in real-world OS by self-reported race or ADI.

The researchers concluded that their study is “the first real-world cohort analysis demonstrating that in patients with NSCLC who underwent broad molecular testing and then were treated with first-line IO, there were no significant differences in real-world overall survival by race or area deprivation. Future work should examine improved access to biomarker testing and guideline-concordant therapy on mitigating racial and socioeconomic health disparities.”

Source: Rivers Z, Nimeiri H, Hyun SW, et al. Real-world evaluation of racial and socioeconomic disparities in patients with NSCLC treated with immunotherapy. Abstract of a poster presented at the 2023 North America Conference on Lung Cancer; December 1-3, 2023; Chicago, Illinois.