Safety and efficacy of immune checkpoint inhibitors in advanced cancer patients with autoimmune disease: A meta-analysis

Cancer patients with autoimmune disease (AID) are usually excluded from clinical trials involving immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs). The available electronic databases were systematically searched from inception until July 3, 2022. We recorded the incidence of immune-related adverse events (irAEs), progression-free survival (PFS), and overall survival (OS) data of included studies. This meta-analysis included 14 studies comprising 11511 participants; however, only 8716 participants were treated with ICI. Therefore, the analysis was conducted on 8716 patients (769 patients with AID compared to 7947 patients without AID). The pooled risk ratio (RR) for any grade and grade ≥3 irAEs was 1.74 (95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.27-2.37) and 1.43 (95% CI: 1.10-1.88), respectively. The irAEs in the same system as that of the AID were referred to as AID-homogeneous irAEs; in the other cases, there were referred to as AID-heterogeneous irAEs. Subgroup analysis found that the higher risk of AID-homogeneous irAEs contributed to the higher risk of overall irAEs among patients with AID. The pooled hazard ratio (HR) for PFS and OS was 1.09 (95% CI: 0.96–1.24) and 1.07 (95% CI: 0.94-1.22), respectively. The results of PFS and OS subgroup analyses matched the overall results. Patients with AID had a significantly higher risk of developing any grade and ≥3 grade irAEs under ICI therapy, specifically AID-homogeneous irAEs; however, the frequency of AID-heterogeneous irAEs in patients with AID was similar to irAEs in patients without AID. No statistically significant differences in PFS and OS were observed between the two groups.