PD-1/PD-L1 blockade, a novel strategy for targeting metastatic colorectal cancer: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized trials

Currently, standard treatment of patients with metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC) comprises chemotherapy (CT) and/or biological therapy (BT) and/or best supportive care (BSC). The present study performed a meta-analysis on five phase II–III randomized clinical trials, which compared CT/BT/BSC as the control arm with the immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) anti-programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1) or its ligand (PD-L1) alone or in combination with cytotoxic T lymphocyte antigen 4 or mitogen activated protein kinase kinase inhibitors as the experimental arm, to evaluate whether a standard approach could be overcome using the novel target therapy strategy. Pooled hazard ratio (HR) for progression-free survival was 0.95 in favor of the experimental arm [95% confidence interval (CI), 0.74–1.22; P=0.68]. Heterogeneity was significant: Cochran's Q, 21.0; P=0.0082; I(2) index, 76%. Pooled HR for overall survival was 0.88 in favor of the experimental arm (95% CI, 0.75–1.02; P=0.08). Heterogeneity was not significant (Cochran's Q, 6.0; P=0.31; I(2) index, 16%). The present meta-analysis demonstrated a trend toward the improvement of survival by PD-1/PD-L1 blockade in mCRC. Further homogeneous studies are necessary to strengthen these results, beyond the known benefits of ICIs in deficient mismatch repair/high microsatellite instability tumors.