National Cancer Institute National Cancer Institute
U.S. National Institutes of Health National Cancer Institute
NCI Home Cancer Topics Clinical Trials Cancer Statistics Research & Funding News About NCI
Clinical Trials (PDQ®)
Patient VersionHealth Professional Version
Last Modified: 3/17/2009     First Published: 11/24/2002  
Page Options
Print This Page  Print This Page
E-Mail This Document  E-Mail This Document
Clinical Trial Questions?

Get Help:

1-800-4-CANCER or

LiveHelp online chat

Quick Links
Help Using the NCI Clinical Trials Search Form

Educational Materials About Clinical Trials

About NCI's Cancer Clinical Trials Registry

Dictionary of Cancer Terms

NCI Drug Dictionary
Phase I/II Pilot Study of Adoptive Immunotherapy With CD8+ WT1-Specific CTL Clones for Patients With Advanced Myelodysplastic Syndromes (MDS), Chronic Myelogenous Leukemia (CML), Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML), or Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL) After Allogeneic Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplant

Alternate Title
Basic Trial Information
Objectives
Entry Criteria
Expected Enrollment
Outcomes
Outline
Trial Contact Information
Registry Information

Alternate Title

Biological Therapy in Treating Patients With Advanced Acute or Chronic Myeloid Leukemia or Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia Who Are Undergoing Stem Cell Transplantation

Basic Trial Information

PhaseTypeStatusAgeSponsorProtocol IDs
Phase II, Phase IBiomarker/Laboratory analysis, TreatmentActive75 and underNCIFHCRC-1655.00
5430, NCT00052520

Objectives

Primary

  1. Determine the safety and potential toxicities associated with infusing donor CD8+ CTL clones for WT1 in patients at high risk for post-transplant relapse of myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS), chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML), acute myeloid leukemia (AML), or acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL).

Secondary

  1. Determine the in vivo persistence of transferred T-cells and assess migration to the bone marrow, predominant site of leukemic relapse.
  2. Determine if adoptively transferred WT1-specific T-cells mediate antileukemic activity.

Entry Criteria

Disease Characteristics:

  • Planned allogeneic stem cell transplantation for one of the following diagnoses:
    • Refractory anemia with excess blasts (RAEB)
    • Refectory anemia with excess blast in transformation (RAEB-t)
    • Chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) beyond chronic phase
    • Primary refractory acute myeloid leukemia (AML) or acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL)
    • AML or ALL beyond first remission
    • Therapy-related AML at any stage
    • Philadelphia chromosome-positive ALL at any stage
    • Acute leukemia at any stage arising from myelodysplastic or myeloproliferative syndromes, including:
      • Chronic myelomonocytic leukemia
      • CML
      • Polycythemia vera
      • Essential thrombocytosis
      • Angiogenic myeloid metaplasia with myelofibrosis


  • Patient and donor must both express an HLA-allele for which it is possible to generate WT1-specific clones


  • No grade III or IV graft-versus-host disease unresponsive to therapy or requiring therapy with any of the following:
    • Prednisone or corticosteroid equivalent > 0.5 mg/kg/day
    • Anti-CD3 monoclonal antibody
    • Other treatments resulting in T-cell inactivation or ablation


  • No graft rejection or failure


  • Able and willing to provide blood and bone marrow samples


  • Highest-risk disease group: More than 5% blasts detected in bone marrow or peripheral blood just prior to or at time of transplantation


  • Relapsed-disease group: One of the following types of relapsed disease after transplantation:
    • Morphologic relapse defined by one or more of the following:
      • Peripheral blasts in absence of growth factor therapy
      • Bone marrow blasts more than 5% of nucleated cells
      • Extramedullary chloroma or granulocytic sarcoma
    • Cells with abnormal immunophenotype and consistent with leukemia relapse in the peripheral blood or bone marrow detected by flow cytometry
    • Cytogenetic relapse defined as the appearance in 1 or more metaphases from peripheral blood or bone marrow of either a non-constitutional cytogenetic abnormality identified in at least 1 cytogenetic study performed before transplantation or a new abnormality known to be associated with leukemia
    • An increase in the number of Philadelphia chromosome metaphases from bone marrow or peripheral blood between 2 consecutive samples in patients with CML
    • An increase in the percentage of bcr-abl positive cells by fluorescence in situ hybridization between 2 consecutive samples
    • Molecular relapse defined as one of the following:
      • 1 or more positive PCR assays for clonotypic immunoglobulin heavy chain (IgH) gene rearrangement for patients with B-cell ALL
      • 1 or more positive PCR assays for T-cell receptor (TCR) gene rearrangement for patients with T-cell ALL
      • 1 or more positive post-transplantation reverse transcription PCR assays for bcr-abl mRNA fusion transcripts in patients with bcr-abl-positive ALL
      • A positive PCR assay for bcr-abl mRNA fusion transcript that quantitatively increases by > 1 order of magnitude on a subsequent sample in patients with CML


Prior/Concurrent Therapy:

Biologic therapy

  • See Disease Characteristics

Chemotherapy

  • No concurrent hydroxyurea

Endocrine therapy

  • See Disease Characteristics
  • Concurrent immunosuppressive therapy for graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) allowed if meets 1 of the following criteria:
    • Corticosteroid dose can be tapered to no more than 0.5 mg/kg/day without an increase to grade III or IV acute GVHD or progression of chronic GVHD

Radiotherapy

  • Not specified

Surgery

  • Not specified

Other

  • No other concurrent agents that may interfere with the function or survival of infused CTL clones

Patient Characteristics:

Age

  • 75 and under

Performance status

  • Karnofsky 40-100%

    OR

  • Lansky 40-100%

Life expectancy

  • Not specified

Other

  • No pre-existing nonhematopoietic organ toxicity greater than grade 2

Expected Enrollment

15

A total of 10-15 patients will be accrued for this study within 3-5 years.

Outcomes

Primary Outcome(s)

Safety and toxicity by Common Toxicity Criteria at 2 years
Aplasia

Secondary Outcome(s)

In vivo persistence of transferred T cells and migration to the bone marrow by Multimer staining and T-cell receptor analysis periodically up to 2 years or until no detectable clones
Antileukemic activity by clinical response (bone marrow and peripheral blood analysis) periodically up to 2 years
Hematopoietic suppression (i.e., neutropenia, lymphopenia, thrombocytopenia, and anemia)
Grade 3 or 4 renal dysfunction
Grade 3 or 4 toxicity in any organ system
Efficacy as measured by response rate and remission

Outline

This is a pilot study.

Donors undergo leukapheresis for stem cell harvest to generate CD8-positive Wilms' tumor (WT1) gene-specific cytotoxic T-lymphocyte (CTL) clones at the time of allogeneic stem cell transplantation.

After post-transplantation hematopoietic recovery, patients receive treatment for either highest-risk disease (prophylactically) or relapsed disease.

  • Highest-risk disease group: Patients receive CD8-positive Wilms' tumor (WT1) gene-specific CTL clones IV over 1-2 hours on days 0, 14, and 28. Patients receive interleukin-2 subcutaneously twice daily on days 28-42 in the absence of unacceptable toxicity.


  • Relapsed-disease group: Some patients with evidence of leukemic relapse may receive standard salvage chemotherapy prior to donor CTL infusions and then receive CD8-positive Wilms' tumor (WT1) gene-specific CTL clones and interleukin-2 as in the highest-risk group.


Patients in both groups who have progressive disease after complete or partial response to therapy may be eligible for retreatment with CD8-positive Wilms' tumor (WT1) gene-specific CTL clones.

Blood samples may be collected monthly and patients may undergo a bone marrow biopsy every 3 months. Samples are analyzed for WT1 specific T cells via multimer staining and flow cytometric analysis; functional anti-WT1 activity; other immunological parameters; WT 1 expression; and potential genetic markers. In addition samples may be assessed by morphology, flow cytometry, PCR or cytogenetic analysis.

After completion of study treatment, patients are followed for up to 2 years.

Trial Contact Information

Trial Lead Organizations

Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center

Gunnar Ragnarsson, MD, MSC, Protocol chair
Ph: 206-667-5918
Email: gunnib@u.washington.edu

Trial Sites

U.S.A.
Washington
  Seattle
 Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
 Gunnar Ragnarsson, MD, MSC
Ph: 206-667-5918
 Email: gunnib@u.washington.edu
 Seattle Cancer Care Alliance
 Clinical Trials Office - Seattle Cancer Care Alliance
Ph: 800-804-8824

Registry Information
Official Title Phase I/II Study Of Adoptive Immunotherapy With CD8+ WT1-Specific CTL Clones for Patients with Advanced MDS, CML, AML or ALL After Allogeneic Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplant
Trial Start Date 2002-09-09
Trial Completion Date 2010-08-15 (estimated)
Registered in ClinicalTrials.gov NCT00052520
Date Submitted to PDQ 2002-10-09
Information Last Verified 2009-07-05
NCI Grant/Contract Number CA18029, CA96669, CA15704

Note: The purpose of most clinical trials listed in this database is to test new cancer treatments, or new methods of diagnosing, screening, or preventing cancer. Because all potentially harmful side effects are not known before a trial is conducted, dose and schedule modifications may be required for participants if they develop side effects from the treatment or test. The therapy or test described in this clinical trial is intended for use by clinical oncologists in carefully structured settings, and may not prove to be more effective than standard treatment. A responsible investigator associated with this clinical trial should be consulted before using this protocol.

Back to TopBack to Top

A Service of the National Cancer Institute
Department of Health and Human Services National Institutes of Health USA.gov