A Phase 3 interventional study of Pembrolizumab and Sacituzumab tirumotecan in Triple-Negative Breast Cancer, sponsored by Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC. Recruiting at 314 sites in 31 countries. Open to participants aged 18 Years and older. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2026-11-05.
Sponsored by Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC (part of Merck & Co., Inc) · Phase 3, Interventional, and Treatment
This is a randomized, open-label study comparing the efficacy and safety of adjuvant sacituzumab tirumotecan (MK-2870) in combination with pembrolizumab compared to treatment of physician's choice (TPC) in participants with triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) who received neoadjuvant therapy and did not achieve a pathological complete response (pCR) at surgery. The primary objective is to compare sacituzumab tirumotecan plus pembrolizumab to TPC (pembrolizumab or pembrolizumab plus capecitabine) with respect to invasive disease-free survival (iDFS) per investigator assessment. It is hypothesized that sacituzumab tirumotecan plus pembrolizumab is superior to TPC with respect to iDFS per investigator assessment.
1,219 studies on the registry are indexed under Triple Negative Breast Neoplasms; 446 are open to participants now.
This study's planned enrollment of 1,530 is above the median of 60 across 1,053 interventional studies indexed under Triple Negative Breast Neoplasms.
Browse Triple Negative Breast Neoplasms studies →Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC is the lead sponsor of 2,166 studies on the registry; 132 are open to participants now.
Of its 501 completed or terminated interventional studies of FDA-regulated products, 370 (74%) have results posted.
Counted across the registry records on this site, refreshed daily.
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.
Exclusion Criteria:
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
The New York Heart Association’s four classes of how much heart failure limits physical activity.
Studies set their own limit — many outside heart failure leave out class III–IV, while heart failure studies may ask for a particular class. Check the class this study names.
On an ECG, the QT interval is the time the heart’s lower chambers take to activate electrically and recover in each beat. QTc is that time adjusted for heart rate (QTcF by Fridericia’s formula, QTcB by Bazett’s). Some medicines lengthen it, and a long QTc can raise the risk of a dangerous heart rhythm.
The study may name a correction formula and a limit in milliseconds, often around 450–480.
CYP3A is a group of enzymes, mainly CYP3A4, in the liver and gut that break down many medicines. Some medicines, supplements and foods (grapefruit, St John’s wort) slow them down or speed them up, which changes how much of a study drug stays in the body.
Studies list them so they can be avoided or switched; bring a list of everything you take, including supplements.
A planned gap after a treatment, so that its effects can lessen before the study treatment or a study assessment. Ask the study team and the doctor who prescribed it before changing any medicine.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
NYHA class (heart failure)
The New York Heart Association’s four classes of how much heart failure limits physical activity.
Studies set their own limit — many outside heart failure leave out class III–IV, while heart failure studies may ask for a particular class. Check the class this study names.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
QT and QTc
On an ECG, the QT interval is the time the heart’s lower chambers take to activate electrically and recover in each beat. QTc is that time adjusted for heart rate (QTcF by Fridericia’s formula, QTcB by Bazett’s). Some medicines lengthen it, and a long QTc can raise the risk of a dangerous heart rhythm.
The study may name a correction formula and a limit in milliseconds, often around 450–480.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
CYP3A (CYP3A4) inhibitors and inducers
CYP3A is a group of enzymes, mainly CYP3A4, in the liver and gut that break down many medicines. Some medicines, supplements and foods (grapefruit, St John’s wort) slow them down or speed them up, which changes how much of a study drug stays in the body.
Studies list them so they can be avoided or switched; bring a list of everything you take, including supplements.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Washout period
A planned gap after a treatment, so that its effects can lessen before the study treatment or a study assessment. Ask the study team and the doctor who prescribed it before changing any medicine.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Participants receive pembrolizumab every 6 weeks (q6w) in combination with sacituzumab tirumotecan every 2 weeks (q2w) for 24 weeks. In addition, participants receive an antihistamine, an H2 antagonist of investigator's choice, acetaminophen (or equivalent), and dexamethasone (or equivalent) per each drug's product label prior to sacituzumab tirumotecan infusions.
Biological: Pembrolizumab · Biological: Sacituzumab tirumotecan
Participants receive pembrolizumab q6w or pembrolizumab q6w in combination with capecitabine (twice daily \[BID\] on Days 1 to 14 and 22 to 35 every 42 days x 4 \[2 weeks 1, 1 week off\]) for 24 weeks.
Biological: Pembrolizumab · Drug: Capecitabine
Pembrolizumab 400 mg intravenous (IV) infusion q6w
Also known as: KEYTRUDA®, MK-3475, SCH 900475
Sacituzumab tirumotecan 4 mg/kg IV infusion q2w
Also known as: MK-2870
Capecitabine 1000 mg/m\^2 to 1250 mg/m\^2 by mouth BID
Also known as: XELODA
Invasive Disease-Free Survival (iDFS)
iDFS is the time from randomization to invasive local, regional, or distant recurrence, invasive contralateral breast cancer, or death due to any cause, whichever occurs first.
Time frame: Up to ~77 months
Overall Survival (OS)
OS is the time from randomization to death due to any cause.
Time frame: Up to ~101 months
Distant recurrence-free survival (DRFS)
DRFS is the time from randomization to distant recurrence or death due to any cause, whichever occurs first.
Time frame: Up to ~101 months
Change from baseline in European Organization for the Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire Core 30 (EORTC QLQ-C30) Global Health Status (Item 29) and Quality of Life (Item 30) Combined Score
EORTC QLQ-C30 is a 30-item scale to assess the overall quality of life in cancer patients. The overall functioning score is based on participant responses that are scored on a 7-point scale (1 = "Very poor" to 7 = "Excellent"). Higher scores indicate better overall health status.
Time frame: Baseline and up to ~60 months
Change from baseline in EORTC QLQ-C30 Physical Functioning (Items 1-5) Combined Score
EORTC QLQ-C30 is a 30-item scale to assess the overall quality of life of cancer patients. The physical functioning score is based on participant responses to questions that scored on a 4-point scale (1 = 'Not at All' to 4 = 'Very Much'). Higher scores indicate better physical functioning.
Time frame: Baseline and up to ~60 months
Change from baseline in EORTC QLQ-C30 Role Functioning (Items 6 and 7) Combined Score
EORTC QLQ-C30 is a 30-item scale to assess the overall quality of life of cancer patients. The role functioning score is based on participant responses to questions that scored on a 4-point scale (1 = 'Not at All' to 4 = 'Very Much'). Higher scores indicate better role functioning.
Time frame: Baseline and up to ~60 months
Change from baseline in EORTC QLQ-C30 Fatigue (Items 10, 12, and 18) Combined Score
EORTC QLQ-C30 is a 30-item scale to assess the overall quality of life of cancer patients. Participant responses to questions about their fatigue are scored on a 4-point scale (1 = "Not at All" to 4 = "Very Much"). Lower scores indicate a better level of fatigue.
Time frame: Baseline and up to ~60 months
Number of participants who experience one or more adverse events (AEs)
An AE is any untoward medical occurrence in a clinical study participant, temporally associated with the use of study intervention, whether or not considered related to the study intervention.
Time frame: Up to ~42 weeks
Number of participants who discontinue study intervention due to an AE
An AE is any untoward medical occurrence in a clinical study participant, temporally associated with the use of study intervention, whether or not considered related to the study intervention.
Time frame: Up to 24 weeks
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Plan to share: Yes — https://trialstransparency.msdclinicaltrials.com/pdf/ProcedureAccessClinicalTrialData.pdf
Data sharing details ↗ · externaldatasharing-msd.com
From the registry record's own update history. This site started tracking changes on Sep 25, 2026; for anything earlier, see the record history on ClinicalTrials.gov ↗
Eligibility is decided by the study team. Share this record with your doctor or contact the team directly.
Contact study teamGet an email when the registry record changes — status, dates, results — or when someone posts here.
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Studies of the drug tested here: Sacituzumab tirumotecan
Triple Negative Breast Neoplasms →