Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2023 Nov 8;28(1):495.
doi: 10.1186/s40001-023-01464-1.

A comprehensive review on immune checkpoint inhibitors induced cardiotoxicity characteristics and associated factors

Fabrice Yves Ndjana Lessomo  1 , Oscar Onayi Mandizadza  2 , Chishimba Mukuka  3 , Zhi-Quan Wang  4
Affiliations
Review

A comprehensive review on immune checkpoint inhibitors induced cardiotoxicity characteristics and associated factors

Fabrice Yves Ndjana Lessomo et al. Eur J Med Res. .

Abstract

Newly approved cancer drugs called ICIs have shown remarkable success in improving patient survival rates, but they also have the potential for inflammatory and immune-related side effects, including those affecting the cardiovascular system. Research has been conducted to understand the development of these toxicities and identify risk factors. This review focuses on the characteristics of ICI-induced cardiotoxicity and discusses the reported risk factors. It is important for cardio-oncologists to understand the basic concepts of these drugs to better understand how cardiotoxicities occur. It might be hard to find reports, where all patients treated with ICIs had developed cardiac toxicity, because there could be other existing and variable factors that influence the likelihood or risk of developing cardiotoxicity during treatment. Various clinical parameters have been explored as potential risk factors, and further investigation is needed through large-scale studies.

Keywords: Cancer; Immune checkpoint; Myocarditis; Risk factor; Therapy.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

None declared.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Simplified mechanism of ICI-induced cardiotoxicity
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
ICI-induced myocarditis severity grading
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Bagchi S, Yuan R, Engleman EG. Immune checkpoint inhibitors for the treatment of cancer: clinical impact and mechanisms of response and resistance. Annu Rev Pathol. 2021;16(1):223–249. doi: 10.1146/annurev-pathol-042020-042741. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Ndjana Lessomo FY, Wang Z, Mukuka C. Comparative cardiotoxicity risk of pembrolizumab versus nivolumab in cancer patients undergoing immune checkpoint inhibitor therapy: A meta-analysis. Front Oncol. 2023 Mar 29;13:1080998. 10.3389/fonc.2023.1080998. PMID: 37064101; PMCID: PMC10090546. - PMC - PubMed
    1. Reck M, Rodríguez-Abreu D, Robinson AG, Hui R, Csőszi T, et al. Pembrolizumab versus chemotherapy for PD-L1-positive non-small cell lung cancer. N Engl J Med. 2016;375(19):1823–1833. doi: 10.1056/NEJMoa1606774. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Mahoney KM, Rennert PD, Freeman GJ. Combination cancer immunotherapy and new immunomodulatory targets. Nat Rev Drug Discov. 2015;14(8):561–584. doi: 10.1038/nrd4591. - DOI - PubMed
    1. Weber JS, Kahler KC, Hauschild A. Management of immune-related adverse events and kinetics of response with ipilimumab. J Clin Oncol. 2012;30(21):2691–2697. doi: 10.1200/JCO.2012.41.6750. - DOI - PubMed

Substances

LinkOut - more resources