PD-L1 as a Biomarker in Immunotherapy in Solid Tumors

Introduction
The immune system is one of the most complex in our body and has evolved through continuous confrontation fundamentally against pathogenic organisms that are considered external threats to our individuality and integrity. But in addition to defending itself against the threat of foreign substances, it can also defend itself against modified substances from the body itself or against signals that our cells can emit in pathological situations.

In the case of cancer, during its initial development, the immune system monitors and detects the appearance of tumor cells; but in the face of continued and persistent evolution of these abnormal cells, the immune cells become ineffective. This interaction between the immune system and the tumor cell is finely regulated by multiple factors, including the PD-1/PD-L1 axis.

These PD-1/PD-L1 factors are of great clinical interest due to the demonstration that the unblocking of this interaction leads in many cases to the restoration of host immunity against the tumor, and this translates into responses with proven clinical benefit in different types of tumors such as melanoma, lung, kidney and bladder cancer.

Objectives
The selection of which patients benefit from an immunotherapy aimed at modulating the PD-1/PD-L1 interaction is an important clinical question. The study of the expression of PD-L1 as a predictive biomarker by immunohistochemistry has been used for a few years in the care practice of various tumors, such as non-small cell lung cancer.

New data from multiple clinical trials based on immunotherapy are extending the use of PD-L1 beyond this type of tumors, based on different assays or immunohistochemical antibodies and on different methods of biomarker assessment.

In addition, the determination of PD-L1 and the results obtained are influenced by many factors such as the pre-analytical conditions of sample processing, the heterogeneity in the expression of the marker in a tumor or the modification of the expression in different evolutions of the disease.

This course aims to deepen the knowledge and understanding of PD-L1 as a predictive biomarker for immunotherapy, the different immunohistochemical assay options and the different interpretation methods for various types of tumors in which these treatments have proven effective.

Who is it for
This course is aimed at specialist and general pathologists and residents, medical oncologists, biologists and biomedical doctors who are working in hospitals, and for specialists in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industry.

Enrollment school periods:

1st edition: from September 1 to November 28, 2021
2nd edition: from December 1, 2021 to February 27, 2022
3rd edition: from March 1 to May 29, 2022
4th edition: from June 1 to August 28, 2022

Event validated with the FENIN Code of Ethics.