Dr. Pal highlights early data on DFF332 in renal cell carcinoma

In this video, Sumanta K. Pal, MD, FASCO, provides preliminary insights on DFF332 in patients with advanced clear cell renal cell carcinoma. Data on DFF332 were highlighted in the abstract, “Preliminary safety, pharmacokinetics and clinical activity of DFF332, an oral HIF2α inhibitor, as monotherapy in a phase 1 dose escalation study in patients with advanced clear cell renal cell carcinoma,” which was presented at the 2024 American Society for Clinical Oncology Annual Meeting in Chicago, Illinois. Pal is a professor in the department of medical oncology & therapeutic research, the chair of the kidney and bladder cancer disease team, and the co-director of the kidney cancer program at City of Hope in Duarte, California.

Video Transcript:

DFF332 is an agent that, much like belzutifan and other therapies, actually blocks hypoxia-inducible factor-2α. It’s an orally administered agent that’s taken daily, or weekly in the context of the trial that we explored. In this dose escalation phase 1 trial, we looked at a relatively large cohort of patients, more than 50 patients, with metastatic renal cell carcinoma. We actually made our way through dose escalation so far with no substantial evidence of hypoxia [and] not a lot of severe anemia, which makes it relatively unique. Having said that, the response rates that we saw weren’t necessarily comparable with what we see with belzutifan. But, this was a very heavily pretreated population of patients, and I think that’s important to bear in mind. My hope is that the DFF332 approach may potentially be one that’s palatable in combination with other therapies. Maybe this is something that we’ll see used, for instance, in combination with other targeted therapies or immune checkpoint inhibitors.

This transcription has been edited for clarity.