Pluvicto Shortage Regresses Prostate Cancer Care

Roby Thomas, MD, a medical oncologist, and hematologist at UPMC Hillman Cancer Center, provides discusses the ongoing shortage of the PSMA-targeted radionuclide therapy, Lu¹⁷⁷ vipivotide tetraxetan (Pluvicto) and its impact on care.

According to Roby, the introduction of PSMA therapy to the metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer treatment landscape created much excitement. However, the national shortage occurred shortly after the March 2022 FDA approval.

0:08 | More recently for like prostate cancer, t's one of those things where we have the VISION study [NCT03511664] demonstrating the utility of Pluvicto in a highly refractory setting. There were high response rates, which is very promising for patients who have had multiple lines of therapy, including chemotherapy. This national shortage is another example of having some throughput, and it was getting exciting, patients were getting this life-changing medication at our institutions. But now, this has all come to a screeching halt. We have patients on months long waiting lists when this may be all the time they have, and so it's been really disheartening to have to deal with these things.

1:07 | As a clinician, you do your best, but, you know, it's hard to have those conversations with patients that, [for example], hey, we don't have this treatment. It's been a very promising high response rate, durable response rate, but, unfortunately, the main issue is that we just don't have it here. And to have to say, we might be able to get it in Europe, or go to Australia or New Zealand, that's just not something that you’d think you would be saying to somebody in the United States of America. So, it's been a challenge. It’s definitely one that we do our best to work around, but at the end of the day, it's just it's, it's not really acceptable.