Dr. Reck Shares Insights From Novel Immunotherapies Session at ELCC 2025

Martin Reck, MD, PhD, of the LungenClinic Grosshansdorf, joined Lung Cancers Today to share key insights from the European Lung Cancer Congress 2025 session titled “Novel immunotherapies beyond the PD1 pathway.”

Dr. Reck presented a talk titled “New actionable immune checkpoints” during the educational session, which was chaired by Solange Peters, MD, PhD, and Natasha Leighl, MD.

“This has been a very, very interesting session, touching all the fields of development that we see for this new opportunity in immunotherapy,” Dr. Reck said.

He explained that it was important to discuss new actionable immune checkpoints because there are a “huge variety of new checkpoint inhibitors in development” beyond the PD1 pathway, which include anti-TIGIT antibodies, anti-LAG-3 antibodies, and more.

“We have seen the first signals in clinical trials; we will need the confirmatory trials to see the true value of these new checkpoint inhibitors,” Dr. Reck said. “This is work that is currently ongoing.”

However, he explained what the data have shown about using new checkpoint inhibitors.

“What we have learned so far is that, indeed, the majority of these new checkpoint inhibitors require a combination with an anti-PD1, anti-PDL1 antibody as a backbone.” Dr. Reck said. “They do not work sufficiently alone.”

In addition to Dr. Reck’s presentation, the session also featured a talk titled “Bispecifics and T cell engagers: fighting against immune desert” by Dr. Peters. Dr. Reck explained why covering this topic in the context of lung cancer was important.

“We know this concept from hematologic and malignancies. But now, the majority of bispecific antibodies are developed in the field of solid tumors… there is a huge variety now in clinical development,” he explained.  “We have seen quite encouraging early signals in patients with untreated non-small cell lung cancer, but also in the difficult setting of immunotherapy-refractory non-small cell lung cancer, so we might expect a lot of exciting new data and perspectives for our patients in the near future.”

The session also featured a presentation titled “Vaccines: how and when?” by Melissa L. Johnson, MD. Dr. Reck explained that although there have been negative trials of vaccination strategies for lung cancer, the field has done a “thorough revision of our concepts” surrounding vaccines.

With updated vaccines and “personalized concepts” for vaccinations, Dr. Reck said the progress is “quite encouraging.”

“This has to be transitioned to clinical improvements, but this is something which is now going on in a number of prospective clinical trials,” he said.

The session concluded with a presentation by Ben Creelan, MD, titled “Cellular therapies: the future?” Dr. Reck explained that this presentation was “looking on the horizon, what might come up in the next years” with cellular therapies.

“This is a very exciting topic where we can induce very long-lasting control of tumor diseases,” Dr. Reck said.

Although there are some challenges regarding the manufacturing and tolerability of cellular therapies, Dr. Reck explained that there are “clear signals of efficacy” and that cellular therapies are advancing rapidly in lung cancer and other solid tumors.

Overall, Dr. Reck concluded that an entire “universe of new immunotherapies is coming up for patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer. “