Case Report: Sequential Chemotherapy and Immunotherapy Produce Sustained Response in Osteosarcoma With High Tumor Mutational Burden

Background: Immunotherapy has provided an effective method for the treatment of many cancers. However, its efficacy in osteosarcoma is not satisfactory so far.

Case presentation: Here, we presented a case of osteosarcoma treated with sequential chemotherapy and immunotherapy and showed promising therapeutic potential. The 29-year-old female patient presented 9^th rib osteosarcoma with suspected right lung lower lobe metastasis. Surgery was performed to remove the primary lesion, and a series of chemotherapies were given afterward in consideration of the response and tolerance. The right lung lower lobe metastasis was under control first but progressed (PD) 9 months after the initiation of therapy. The lesion was surgically removed and subsequent chemotherapy was implemented. The patient had good tolerance with chemotherapy and maintained well for approximately 11 months before the discovery of 11^th rib and right lung upper lobe metastases. Surgery was then performed on both lesions and achieved complete response. Post-surgical brief chemotherapy and subsequent long-term immunotherapy (pembrolizumab) maintained continuous remission for 33 months. The patient survived for 60 months with well-controlled disease from the time of confirmed diagnosis. Genetic alterations of all primary and metastatic lesions were investigated by whole-exome sequencing (WES). Substantial similarity in mutational landscape between the primary lesion and 11^th rib metastasis and between the two lung metastases were revealed, while substantial heterogeneity was found between the rib lesions and lung metastases. The tumor mutational burden (TMB) for the 9^th rib primary lesion, the metastatic 11^th rib lesion, and the metastatic right upper and lower lobe nodule tissues was 8.02, 2.38, 4.61, and 0.14 mutations/Mb, respectively. The primary lesion exhibited the most diverse copy number variation (CNV) changes among all lesions. Furthermore, pathway enrichment analysis also suggested significant heterogeneity among the lesions.

Conclusions: Surgery with sequential chemotherapy and maintenance immunotherapy was shown to have good response for the first time on osteosarcoma patient who had high TMB tumor lesions and good tolerance for chemotherapy and immunotherapy.