ClinicalTrials.gg
Status unknownNCT03379441MP-LALCUpdated Dec 22, 2017

Pembrolizumab (MK-3475) as Maintainance in Treated Patients With Unresectable Stage III NSCLC

A Phase 2 interventional study of Pembrolizumab Injectable Product in Non Small Cell Lung Cancer Patients, sponsored by University of Turin, Italy. Status unknown at 14 sites in Italy. Open to participants aged 18 Years to 75 Years. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2017-12-22.

Sponsored by University of Turin, Italy · Phase 2, Interventional, and Treatment

The sponsor has not verified this record recently (last verified Dec 2017), so the status shown — last known as Not yet recruiting — may be out of date.

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Phase
Phase 2
Study type
Interventional
Enrollment
126
Allocation
Randomized
Ages
18 Years to 75 Years
Sex
All
01

Where this study stands

Counted across the records on this site · 2026-11-15

Among 127 studies testing pembrolizumab in Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung — 29 open to participants now, 48 under way, 13 of them phase 3. pembrolizumab · Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung.

Planned enrollment
45th of 127
126 · median 65
Started
2018
with 14 others
Phase 2
65 of 127
20 open now
Registered
47th of 127
by date

Among the 127 studies testing pembrolizumab in Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung, this one is the 45th largest by planned enrollment, is one of 15 that started in 2018, is one of 65 in phase 2, and was the 47th registered.

Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung

7,621 studies on the registry are indexed under Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung; 1,837 are open to participants now.

Browse Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung studies →

Open to participants now

29 of the 127 studies testing pembrolizumab in Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung are open now, in 10 countries. Recruiting first, the newest first:

24 more — sign in →

By country, each count listing its studies:

All 29 open studies →

About pembrolizumab

pembrolizumab: first FDA approval 2014 (KEYTRUDA), first EMA approval 2015. What it is approved for, and how studies give it, is on its page →

Who these studies take

Of the 1,326 Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung studies recruiting now, 988 (75%) set no upper age limit and 225 (17%) stop at 75 or younger; 34 take children under 18; 40 take healthy volunteers.

This study: 18 Years to 75 Years · all sexes · no healthy volunteers.

The full table on the hub →

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Watch this landscapeDownload CSVNarrow it in search →With an account: a weekly mail of what changed among 127 studies testing pembrolizumab in Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung, or all of them as a file.
02

Study summary

Maintainance therapy in patients with unresectable stage III, NSCLC Stage IIIA-B, unresectable, NSCLC, treated with definitive Chemo-Radiotherapy

Read the detailed description

This is an Italian multi-center randomized phase II trial (randomization 2:1) of intravenous (IV) MK-3475 (Pembrolizumab) versus observation as a maintenance therapy after chemo-radiotherapy (either concomitant or sequential, regardless of the type of chemotherapy used) in unresectable stage IIIA-IIIB non small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients.

03

Conditions studied

  • Non Small Cell Lung Cancer Patients
04

Who can participate

Ages eligible
18 Years to 75 Years
Sexes eligible
All
Accepts healthy volunteers
No

Go through the criteria one by one — yes, no or not sure — and take the list to your doctor or the study team. Kept in this browser only.

Inclusion criteria

  • Be willing and able to provide written /assent for the trial.
  • Be > 18 years of age on day of signing informed consent.
  • Have based on 1.1.
  • Be willing to provide tissue from a newly obtained core, trucut or excisional biopsy of a tumor lesion. Newly-obtained is defined as a specimen obtained up to 6 weeks (42 days) prior to initiation of treatment on Day 1. Subjects for whom newly-obtained samples cannot be provided (e.g. inaccessible or subject safety concern) may submit an archived specimen only upon agreement from the PI.
  • Have a performance status of 0 or 1 on the Performance Scale.
  • Demonstrate adequate organ function , all screening labs should be performed within 10 days of treatment initiation.
  • Female subject of should have a negative urine or serum pregnancy within 72 hours prior to receiving the first dose of study medication. If the urine test is positive or cannot be confirmed as negative, a serum pregnancy test will be required.
  • Female subjects of childbearing potential should be willing to use 2 methods of or be surgically sterile, or abstain from heterosexual activity for the course of the study through 120 days after the last dose of study medication (Section 8.14.2). Subjects of childbearing potential are those who have not been surgically sterilized or have not been free from menses for > 1 year.
  • Male subjects should agree to use an adequate method of contraception starting with the first dose of study therapy through 120 days after the last dose of study therapy

Exclusion criteria

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Is currently participating and receiving study therapy or has participated in a study of an agent and received study therapy or used an investigational device within 4 weeks of the first dose of treatment.
  • Has a diagnosis of immunodeficiency or is receiving systemic therapy or any other form of therapy within 7 days prior to the first dose of trial treatment.
  • Has a known history of active Bacillus Tuberculosis (TB)
  • to pembrolizumab or any of its .
  • Has had a prior anti-cancer monoclonal antibody (mAb) within 4 weeks prior to study Day 1 or who has not recovered (i.e., ≤ Grade 1 or at baseline) from adverse events due to agents administered more than 4 weeks earlier.
  • Has a known additional that is progressing or requires active treatment. Exceptions include basal cell carcinoma of the skin or squamous cell carcinoma of the skin that has undergone potentially curative therapy or in situ cervical cancer.
  • Has active disease that has required systemic treatment in the past 2 years (i.e. with use of disease modifying agents, corticosteroids or immunosuppressive drugs). Replacement therapy (e.g., thyroxine, insulin, or physiologic corticosteroid replacement therapy for adrenal or pituitary insufficiency, etc.) is not considered a form of systemic treatment.
  • Has a history of (non-infectious) pneumonitis that required steroids or current pneumonitis, or has evidence of interstitial lung disease.
  • Has an active infection requiring systemic therapy.
  • Has a history or current evidence of any condition, therapy, or laboratory abnormality that might confound the results of the trial, interfere with the subject's participation for the full duration of the trial, or is not in the best interest of the subject to participate, in the opinion of the treating investigator.
  • Has known psychiatric or substance abuse disorders that would interfere with cooperation with the requirements of the trial.
  • Is pregnant or breastfeeding, or expecting to conceive or father children within the projected duration of the trial, starting with the pre-screening or screening visit through 120 days after the last dose of trial treatment.
  • Has received prior therapy with an , anti-PD-L1, or anti-PD-L2 agent.
  • Has a known history of (HIV) (HIV 1/2 antibodies).
  • Has known active (e.g., hepatitis B virus surface antigen [HBsAg] reactive) or (e.g., HCV ribonucleic acid [RNA] qualitative is detected).
  • Has received a within 30 days of planned start of study therapy.
Terms in these criteria, in plain language(19)

Underlined terms in the criteria open these too. Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.

Informed consent

Before you join, the study team explains what taking part involves — its purpose, what happens, the risks and possible benefits — and answers your questions, so you can decide freely. Consent is usually recorded on a form (the informed consent form, ICF) signed by you or, where the law allows, by someone legally authorised to decide for you.

You can keep asking questions during the study, you are told of new information that matters, and you can choose to leave at any time.

Measurable disease

The amount of disease can be tracked with a defined measurement, so the study can see whether it shrinks or grows. It might be a tumour measured on a scan or, in some blood cancers such as myeloma, a marker measured in blood or urine.

The criteria or the study team say which measurement counts — having no tumour visible on a scan does not by itself rule you out.

RECIST

The standard rules for measuring tumours on CT or MRI scans, to tell whether a cancer is shrinking, stable or growing during treatment.

“Measurable disease per RECIST 1.1” usually means at least one tumour 10 mm or more at its longest on a CT scan, or a lymph node 15 mm or more across its short axis.

Biopsy and archival tissue

A biopsy takes a small piece of tissue to examine. “Archival tissue” is a sample already taken, for example at diagnosis, and kept by the hospital.

Whether a stored sample will do depends on when it was taken, how much there is and what the study needs. Ask whether the study accepts your stored sample or needs a new biopsy.

ECOG performance status

A scale of how much an illness limits everyday activity. For people being assessed to join a study, scores run from 0 (fully active) to 4; lower is more active.

0
Fully active, no restrictions.
1
Limited in strenuous activity, but walking and able to do light work, such as housework or office work.
2
Walking and able to look after yourself, but unable to work; up and about more than half of waking hours.
3
Able to look after yourself only in part; in bed or a chair more than half of waking hours.
4
Unable to look after yourself at all; in bed or a chair all day.

Studies most often ask for 0–1 or 0–2. Your doctor gives the score; the WHO scale uses the same steps. The full scale also has 5, which records death.

Childbearing potential

Able to become pregnant: from the first period until menopause, unless permanently unable to through surgery (removal of the womb, or of both ovaries or both fallopian tubes).

Criteria for people of childbearing potential usually ask for a negative pregnancy test and for contraception during the study and for a time after it.

Contraception

Ways of preventing pregnancy. “Highly effective” methods fail less than 1% of the time a year when used correctly — for example an IUD or an implant.

Criteria usually say which methods count and how long to keep using them after the last dose, sometimes for male participants too. Some studies accept a partner’s vasectomy if it was confirmed successful and that person is the participant’s only sexual partner.

Investigational drug or device

A drug or device being studied in a clinical trial.

It may be new, or already approved and being studied for another use, dose or form. Criteria often leave out people who took part in another study of one within a recent period, commonly 30 days or five half-lives.

Corticosteroids (steroids)

Anti-inflammatory medicines such as prednisone, prednisolone and dexamethasone — not the anabolic steroids used for muscle.

Studies differ in what they allow: check which steroid medicines, routes (tablets, injections, creams, inhalers, eye drops) and doses this study accepts.

Immunosuppression

A weakened immune system. It can come from an illness, such as HIV or some blood cancers, or from medicines that turn the immune system down, for example after an organ transplant or for an autoimmune disease; steroids at higher doses count.

Read whether the line is about a condition or about medicines, and which medicines and doses it means.

Hypersensitivity

An allergy, or another reaction of the immune system, to a substance. “Hypersensitivity to the study drug” means a known allergic reaction to it — not every side effect a medicine can have.

Excipients

The other ingredients in a medicine besides the active drug, such as fillers, colours or preservatives.

Cancer (malignancy)

Malignancy means cancer. Criteria about another or earlier malignancy ask whether you have had a different cancer, usually within a set number of years.

Some are commonly allowed, such as treated skin cancers other than melanoma and early cancers removed completely — check the exceptions this study lists.

Autoimmune disease

A condition in which the immune system attacks the body’s own tissues, such as rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, psoriasis, type 1 diabetes or inflammatory bowel disease.

Immunotherapy studies often leave out active autoimmune disease, and some name exceptions, such as thyroid disease on replacement hormone. Check the exceptions this study lists.

PD-1, PD-L1 and checkpoint inhibitors

PD-1, PD-L1 and CTLA-4 are proteins that act as brakes on the immune system. Checkpoint inhibitors, such as pembrolizumab or nivolumab, block them so the immune system can attack a cancer.

PD-L1 can also be measured in a tumour sample. Some scores count stained tumour cells only (TPS); others also count certain immune cells (CPS). The study names the score and the minimum it uses.

HIV

The human immunodeficiency virus, which weakens the immune system.

Many studies now accept people whose HIV is controlled on treatment, judged by the viral load and the CD4 count. Check the limits this study sets.

Hepatitis B tests

Hepatitis B is a virus that infects the liver. These are separate tests: HBsAg positive usually means a current infection (a recent vaccination can briefly cause it too); total anti-HBc (HBcAb) positive means an infection now or in the past; HBV DNA measures how much virus is in the blood.

Some studies accept a past infection if HBV DNA is undetectable, sometimes with antiviral medicine during the study. Check what this study allows.

Hepatitis C tests

Hepatitis C is a virus that infects the liver. An HCV antibody test can stay positive after an infection has cleared (and is occasionally positive without one); an HCV RNA test shows whether the virus is there now.

After treatment, hepatitis C counts as cured when HCV RNA is still undetectable 12 weeks or more after the treatment ended. Studies often accept people cured this way.

Live vaccines

Vaccines made with a weakened form of the germ, such as measles–mumps–rubella (MMR), chickenpox and yellow fever. They can be risky when the immune system is weakened. Flu injections are not live; the nasal flu spray is.

05

Study design

Phase
Phase 2
Primary purpose
Treatment
Allocation
Randomized
Intervention model
Parallel assignment
Masking
Double (Participant, Investigator)
Enrollment
126 participants (estimated)

Study arms

  • Experimental
    Experimental

    Pembrolizumab 200 mg Q3W IV infusion Day 1 of each 3 week cycle until: * PD, * unacceptable toxicity, * investigator choice, * patients IC withdrawal, * up to a maximum of 24 months (35 administrations) Experimental

    Drug: Pembrolizumab Injectable Product

  • No intervention
    Observation

Interventions

06

What researchers measure

Primary outcomes

  1. OS

    The primary objective is to evaluate if treatment with chemo-radiotherapy followed by Pembrolizumab (MK-3475) maintenance (up to 24 months) results in superior Overall Survival (OS) in stage IIIA-B, unresectable, NSCLC compared to chemo-radiotherapy (CT-RT) followed by observation

    Time frame: up to 24 months per patient

Secondary outcomes

  1. PFS

    To evaluate Rate (%) of patients without disease progression at 12, 18 and 24 months

    Time frame: up to 24 months per patient

07

Study locations

14 sites
  • CRO Aviano
    Aviano, Pordenone 33081, Italy
    • Alessandra Bearz, MD · Contact
  • AOU San Luigi- Department of Oncology
    Orbassano, Turin 10043, Italy
  • Istituto Tumori Giovanni Paolo II
    Bari, 70124, Italy
    • Domenico Galetta, MD · Contact
  • Chieti Università degli Studi "G. D'Annunzio"
    Chieti, 66100, Italy
    • Clara Natoli, MD · Contact
  • AOU Careggi
    Firenze, 50134, Italy
    • Lorenzo Livi, MD · Contact
  • IRCCS AO San Martino
    Genova, 16132, Italy
    • Francesco Grossi, MD · Contact
  • Azienda Ospedaliera Papardo
    Messina, 98158, Italy
    • Vincenzo Adamo, MD · Contact
  • Istituto Clinico Humanitas
    Milano, 20089, Italy
    • Armando Santoro, MD · Contact
  • Ospedale San Raffaele
    Milano, 20132, Italy
    • Vanesa Gregorc, MD · Contact
  • Policlinico Modena
    Modena, Italy
    • Stefano Cascinu, MD · Contact
  • Istituto Nazionale Tumori IRCCS "Fondazione G. Pascale"
    Napoli, 80131, Italy
    • Alessandro Morabito, MD · Contact
  • Policlinico Universitario Campus Biomedico
    Roma, 00128, Italy
    • Sara Ramella, MD · Contact
  • PO Centrale
    Taranto, 74100, Italy
    • Salvatore Pisconti, MD · Contact
  • Policlinico Verona Borgo Roma
    Verona, 37134, Italy
    • Emilio Bria, MD · Contact
08

Timeline

Tracking since Sep 25, 2026
ElapsedEstimatedEstimated, not yet reachedSimilar studies: half by the dot; the band is the middle halfHalf of similar studies reached it by the dot; the band is the middle half, from a quarter to three quarters

Start is estimated for Jan 2018; primary completion for Jan 2023, 60 months later.

Of 730 non-industry phase 2 interventional studies under Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung, half reached primary completion within 56 months of starting (the median), counting those still running; a quarter within 36 and three quarters within 84. This study's planned 60 months is close to that.

Counting every sponsor, half of 1,047 studies reached it within 48 months; a quarter within 30 and three quarters within 76.

How these figures are worked out, and which studies are left out of them.

Registered
Nov 23, 2017
First posted
Dec 20, 2017
StartEst.
Jan 1, 2018
Primary completionEst.
Jan 1, 2023
CompletionEst.
Jan 1, 2023
Last update
Dec 22, 2017
What these dates mean
Start.
When the first participant enrolled; while estimated, when the study expects to open to recruitment.
Primary completion.
When the last participant was examined or treated to collect data for the study's main question, its primary outcome. A study that stopped early gives the date its data collection stopped.
Completion.
When the last participant's last visit took place, for every outcome, secondary ones and side effects included: the end of the study. Often later than primary completion, sometimes the same day.
Actual and Est.
Actual means the registry says the date has happened. Est. (estimated) is a date the sponsor plans or expects. It can still move, and the sponsor is expected to change it to actual once it has passed.
No changes since tracking began. The registry record was last updated on Dec 22, 2017, before this site started recording changes on Sep 25, 2026. Its history is on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗
09

Registry details

Key details

Study ID
NCT03379441
Responsible party
Prof. Silvia Novello (Principal Investigator, University of Turin, Italy) — Principal investigator
First posted
Dec 20, 2017
Start date
Jan 1, 2018 (estimated)
Primary completion
Jan 1, 2023 (estimated)
Completion
Jan 1, 2023 (estimated)
Last update
Dec 22, 2017

Oversight

FDA-regulated drug
Yes
FDA-regulated device
No
View the source record on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗

Not currently enrolling

This study is status unknown, as verified in Dec 2017. You cannot join it, but the record below documents what was studied.

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Discussion

Questions and observations about this study, from anyone following it. Not medical advice, and not a channel to the study team — their contact details are on the registry record.

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Studies of the drug tested here: Pembrolizumab

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