Progress in the clinical development of investigational systemic agents for recurrent and metastatic nasopharyngeal carcinoma.

Introduction: Nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) remains an endemic disease in certain parts of the world, with many patients presenting with advanced disease on diagnosis. Chemotherapy had remained the standard of care with minimal progress made until recent years. This review aims to provide an overview of recent significant breakthroughs and up-and-coming novel strategies in treating this deadly disease.

Areas covered: This review focuses on the latest clinical development of promising investigational agents in the treatment of advanced NPC. These include anti-vascular agents, signaling pathways inhibitors and immunotherapy.

Expert opinion: The addition of immune-checkpoint inhibitors (CPI) to platinum-based chemotherapy has undoubtedly changed the therapeutic landscape of R/M NPC in the first-line setting. This leaves much room for further research on the optimal treatment strategy in subsequent-line settings, likely including the addition of CPI to anti-vascular agents or novel CPI combinations, with or without chemotherapy as a backbone. Other potential approaches include optimal CPI maintenance therapy after first-line CPI-chemotherapy combination. Potential novel agents on the horizons are antibody-drug conjugates, bi-specific antibodies and signaling inhibitors, with several phase II/III studies currently underway.