Jason Hafron, MD, predicts coming advancements in bladder cancer

The bladder cancer space saw an explosion of advancements last year. In a recent interview with Urology Times®, Jason M. Hafron, MD, CMO, of Michigan Institute of Urology, shared his thoughts on what is yet to come.

He noted, “[There’s] a lot going on in bladder cancer in the non–muscle invasive, muscle-invasive space, as well as in some of the biomarkers, which is exciting and will definitely have a huge impact on the management of your patients.”

In non–muscle invasive bladder cancer, Hafron touched on the recent approvals of nadofaragene firdenovec (Adstiladrin) in December 2022 as well as the approval of nogapendekin alfa inbakicept-pmln (Anktiva) in April 2024. He also highlighted several agents in the pipeline, including TAR-200, cretostimogene grenadenorepvec, and UGN-102.

In the muscle-invasive space, Hafron pointed to the recent readouts from several trials, including Alliance (NCT03244384), CheckMate-274 (NCT02632409), and NIAGARA (NCT03732677), which have had impacts on combinations in both in the adjuvant and neoadjuvant settings.

Lastly, Hafron focused on advancements with biomarkers in the space, namely ctDNA. According to Dr. Hafron, “ctDNA looks like, potentially, the PSA for bladder cancer, in that patients who undergo surgical resection that have positive ctDNA are more likely to respond to a checkpoint inhibitor and also the elevation of ctDNA often predates radiographic or imaging study changes.”