Sustained Therapeutic Efficacy of Humanized Anti-CD19 Chimeric Antigen Receptor T Cells in Relapsed/Refractory Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia

Abstract Purpose: Immunogenicity derived from the murine scFv, a major molecular compomemt of chimeric antigen receptors (CARs), may limit the persistence of CAR T cells, resulting in tumor relapse of patients in complete remission (CR). In this study, we developed a humanized anti-CD19 scFv CAR-T (hCAR-T) to treat patients with relapsed/refractory acute lymphoblastic leukemia (r/r ALL). Patients and Methods: In this one-arm, open-labeled study, we infused the T cells modified with hCAR to patients with r/r ALL. Patients were evaluated with long-term follow-up for response and safety of the treatment. The study was registered at Clinicaltrials.gov (NCT02349698). Results: Ten patients with r/r ALL were recruited for this study. All were response evaluable and all achieved CR; eight patients remained CR, and six were in CR for over 18 months without further treatment. A long-term persistence of hCAR T cells was observed in most of the patients. Among these patients, four of them with high tumor burden and rapidly progressive disease (median, 58%) experienced grade 3–4 cytokine release syndrome (CRS) and neurotoxicity. These severe CRSs were successfully controlled by tocilizumab, glucocorticoid, and plasma exchange. Conclusions: T cells expressing the humanized anti-CD19 scFv CARs exhibited sustained therapeutic efficacy in the treatment of r/r ALL. Low replase rate was associated with the long-term persistence of CAR T cells.