Retevmo Retevmo

Company: Eli Lilly

Approval Status: Approved on 5/8/2020

Specific treatment: Lung and thyroid cancers

RETEVMO is a kinase inhibitor indicated for the treatment of Adult patients with metastatic RET fusion-positive non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), adult and pediatric patients 12 years of age and older with advanced or metastatic RET-mutant medullary thyroid cancer (MTC) who require systemic therapy, adult and pediatric patients 12 years of age and older with advanced or metastatic RET fusion-positive thyroid cancer who require systemic therapy and who are radioactive iodine-refractory (if radioactive iodine is appropriate).

RETEVMO (selpercatinib) is supplied as 40 mg or 80 mg hard gelatin capsules for oral use. Each capsule contains inactive ingredients of microcrystalline cellulose and colloidal silicon dioxide.

Mechanism of Action:

Selpercatinib is a kinase inhibitor. Selpercatinib inhibited wild-type RET and multiple mutated RET isoforms as well as VEGFR1 and VEGFR3 with IC50 values ranging from 0.92 nM to 67.8 nM. In other enzyme assays, selpercatinib also inhibited FGFR 1, 2, and 3 at higher concentrations that were still clinically achievable. In cellular assays, selpercatinib inhibited RET at approximately 60-fold lower concentrations than FGFR1 and 2 and approximately 8-fold lower concentration than VEGFR3. Certain point mutations in RET or chromosomal rearrangements involving in-frame fusions of RET with various partners can result in constitutively activated chimeric RET fusion proteins that can act as oncogenic drivers by promoting cell proliferation of tumor cell lines. In in vitro and in vivo tumor models, selpercatinib demonstrated anti-tumor activity in cells harboring constitutive activation of RET protein resulting from gene fusions and mutations, including CCDC6-RET, KIF5B-RET, RET V804M, and RET M918T. In addition, selpercatinib showed anti-tumor activity in mice intracranially implanted with a patient-derived RET fusion positive tumor.

Side effects:

The most common adverse reactions, including laboratory abnormalities, (≥ 25%) were increased aspartate aminotransferase (AST), increased alanine aminotransferase (ALT), increased glucose, decreased leukocytes, decreased albumin, decreased calcium, dry mouth, diarrhea, increased creatinine, increased alkaline phosphatase, hypertension, fatigue, edema, decreased platelets, increased total cholesterol, rash, decreased sodium, and constipation.