A Phase 2 interventional study of Pembrolizumab 25 MG/1 ML Intravenous Solution [KEYTRUDA] and adjuvant radiochemotherapy in HNSCC, sponsored by University of Leipzig. Completed at 16 sites in Germany. Open to participants aged 18 Years and older. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2026-02-17.
Sponsored by University of Leipzig · Phase 2, Interventional, and Treatment
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Among 62 studies testing pembrolizumab in Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck — 17 open to participants now, 31 under way, 2 of them phase 3. pembrolizumab · Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck.
Among the 62 studies testing pembrolizumab in Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck, this one is the 5th largest by enrollment, is one of 4 that started in 2018, is one of 43 in phase 2, and was the 22nd registered.
2,019 studies on the registry are indexed under Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck; 573 are open to participants now.
Browse Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck studies →17 of the 62 studies testing pembrolizumab in Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck are open now, in 5 countries. Recruiting first, the newest first:
Brown University · Sites in United States
Ages 65+
Emory University · Sites in United States
Ages 18+
National University Hospital, Singapore · Sites in Singapore
Ages 21–99
University of Leipzig · Sites in Germany
Ages 18–70
University of California, Davis · Sites in United States
Ages 18+
By country, each count listing its studies:
pembrolizumab: first FDA approval 2014 (KEYTRUDA), first EMA approval 2015. What it is approved for, and how studies give it, is on its page →
Of the 435 Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck studies recruiting now, 311 (71%) set no upper age limit and 87 (20%) stop at 75 or younger; 5 take children under 18; 13 take healthy volunteers.
This study: 18 Years and older · all sexes · no healthy volunteers.
The full table on the hub →This tab as a report to print or save as PDF → With an account.
On this site’s reading of the record, pembrolizumab is the treatment under test here. Read study by study →
62 studies; the count open now beside each. This study's row is marked.
A study in two phases is counted once above. Listed by phase, each with its combined phases: Phase 1 13 · Phase 2 46 · Phase 3 5 · Phase 4 1
First in 2014; this study’s year is marked. 4 started in 2018.
By drug class, each counting the studies that test any of its medicines:
This study's enrollment of 211 is above the median of 48 across 1,653 interventional studies indexed under Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck.
Median enrollment 52 across the 62 interventional studies. Of the 28 that completed or were terminated, 18 (64%) have results posted.
This tab as a report to print or save as PDF → With an account.
11 of 62 have an industry lead sponsor. The 10 most frequent:
University of Leipzig is the lead sponsor of 148 studies on the registry; 25 are open to participants now.
University of Leipzig has 2 studies filed under Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck — fewer than ten, so there is no comparison to draw.
9 of the studies testing pembrolizumab in Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck that are under way reach primary completion within a year, 2 of them phase 3. Phase 3 first, then by date:
| Study | Primary completion |
|---|---|
| NCT06998069Phase 3Brown UniversityHead and Neck Cancer Study Project in the Geriatric Population | 2026-12-01 |
| NCT06102395Phase 3Beijing Tongren HospitalEvaluating the Efficacy and Safety of Pembrolizumab Plus Standard Chemotherapy in the Neoadjuvant Treatment of Local Advanced (LA) HNSCC | 2027-04-30 |
| NCT06580054University of Michigan Rogel Cancer CenterPembrolizumab for the Treatment of Locally Advanced and/or Recurrent Orbital or Periocular Cutaneous Squamous Cell Carcinoma | 2026-12 |
| NCT06211335University of California, DavisLosartan, Pembrolizumab and Stereotactic Body Radiation Therapy for the Treatment of Patients With Locally Recurrent, Refractory or Oligometastatic Head and Neck Squamous Cell Carcinoma | 2026-12 |
| NCT04754321Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer CenterCombining Immunotherapy Salvage Surgery & IORT Tx Persistent/Recurrent Head & Neck Cancer | 2026-12-31 |
Add all 9 to your calendar (.ics) → With an account.
Among the 62 studies testing pembrolizumab in Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck, from their registry updates:
This tab as a report to print or save as PDF → With an account.
This trial evaluates the addition of pembrolizumab to standard postoperative adjuvant radiochemotherapy in the treatment of patients with locally advanced intermediate and high risk head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC).
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.
Had either intermediate or high-risk characteristics, i.e. any or all of the following:
Exclusion Criteria:
Prior chemotherapy, targeted small molecule therapy, or radiation therapy within one month before enrolment into this trial or who has not recovered (i.e., ≤ grade 1 (NCI CTCAE Grade) at baseline) from adverse events due to a previously administered agent.
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.
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.
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.
Neoadjuvant treatment is given before the main treatment (usually surgery), often to shrink a tumour. Adjuvant treatment is given after it, to lower the chance of the cancer coming back.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
The other ingredients in a medicine besides the active drug, such as fillers, colours or preservatives.
The US National Cancer Institute’s scale of how severe an adverse event is — any unwanted medical event during a study, such as a symptom, an illness or an abnormal test result, whether or not a treatment caused it. Whether it did is judged separately.
“Side effects of earlier treatment resolved to grade 1 or less” means they have settled to mild or gone.
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.
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.
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 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 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.
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.
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.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Adjuvant and neoadjuvant
Neoadjuvant treatment is given before the main treatment (usually surgery), often to shrink a tumour. Adjuvant treatment is given after it, to lower the chance of the cancer coming back.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Excipients
The other ingredients in a medicine besides the active drug, such as fillers, colours or preservatives.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
CTCAE grade
The US National Cancer Institute’s scale of how severe an adverse event is — any unwanted medical event during a study, such as a symptom, an illness or an abnormal test result, whether or not a treatment caused it. Whether it did is judged separately.
“Side effects of earlier treatment resolved to grade 1 or less” means they have settled to mild or gone.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Application of pembrolizumab, i.v., in 3-week cycle (q3w) 200 mg, in combination with standard treatment (adjuvant radio-chemotherapy aRCH)
Drug: Pembrolizumab 25 MG/1 ML Intravenous Solution [KEYTRUDA] · Other: adjuvant radiochemotherapy
adjuvant radio-chemotherapy (aRCH)
Other: adjuvant radiochemotherapy
Drug page: Pembrolizumab
intravenous application, 12 months, in 3-week cycle (q3w) 200 mg
adjuvant radiochemotherapy with cisplatin
Event Free Survival (EFS)
time from randomization to the first event (i.e. locoregional or distant recurrence, initiation of a new anti-cancer treatment death from any cause)
Time frame: 24 months
Overall survival (OS)
time from randomization to death from any cause
Time frame: 24 months
Ran from Aug 2018 to primary completion in Jan 2025, 77 months.
Of 298 non-industry phase 2 interventional studies under Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck, half reached primary completion within 56 months of starting (the median), counting those still running; a quarter within 37 and three quarters within 85. This study's 77 months is above that.
Counting every sponsor, half of 366 studies reached it within 53 months; a quarter within 35 and three quarters within 82.
How these figures are worked out, and which studies are left out of them.
This study is completed, as verified in Apr 2025. You cannot join it, but the record below documents what was studied.
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Studies of the drug tested here: Pembrolizumab
Squamous Cell Carcinoma of Head and Neck →