MSK is a major research institution. During your treatment for pancreatic cancer, your care team may ask if you want to join a clinical trial.
What is a clinical trial?
Clinical trials are research studies that test new treatments, procedures, or devices to see how well they work. They are an important part of helping to prevent, treat, and cure cancer. Almost every cancer treatment given to patients was first tested during a clinical trial.
MSK tests new treatments for pancreatic cancer. Treatment trials test new drugs, drug combinations, devices, and ways of doing procedures, surgery, or radiation therapy.
Sometimes a clinical trial gives you access to new therapies that are not yet available at most hospitals. Talk with your doctor about whether joining a clinical trial is right for you.
Clinical trials are designed to answer questions about:
- Safety
- Benefits
- Side effects
- Whether some people are helped more than others
MSK will start a clinical trial only if our researchers think we can improve methods for cancer:
- Prevention
- Treatment
- Diagnosis
- Screening
For more information, please read Clinical Trials at MSK: What You Need to Know
How MSK is researching new pancreatic cancer treatments
MSK is recruiting people for clinical trials researching new immunotherapy, targeted therapy, and precision medicine approaches for pancreatic cancer. These studies explore ways to target specific genetic mutations. They’re also looking at ways to improve the immune system’s response to cancer. Our researchers are trying new personal treatments based on each tumor’s traits.
Here are some of the ways MSK is exploring new treatments for pancreatic cancer:
- An MSK clinical trial is testing a vaccine using messenger RNA along with another type of immunotherapy. We’re one of a few hospitals testing this treatment for pancreatic cancer.
- We’re studying new treatments for pancreatic cancers with KRAS mutations. They’re common changes in cancer cells that help tumors grow. One trial is testing a treatment that targets the KRAS G12D mutation.
- We’re evaluating new treatments for pancreatic cancers with certain genetic changes, including RAS mutations and MTAP loss. Researchers are studying whether using targeted therapies together can help slow or stop cancer growth.
- We’re researching new ways to use immunotherapy drugs together for pancreatic cancer before surgery.
- We’re researching new maintenance therapy for pancreatic cancer after surgery and chemotherapy. Maintenance therapy is treatment that helps keep the cancer from coming back.
- Through our Pancreatic Tumor Registry, we study things that can raise your risk for pancreatic cancer. We’re looking at both environmental factors and inherited risks, passed on from parents to children. Many people who join this registry are living with pancreatic cancer or have family members who had it.
Our experts can talk with you about which clinical trial is right for you. Here are some of our new clinical trials:
- A Phase 2 Study of an mRNA Vaccine plus Immunotherapy and Chemotherapy Versus Chemotherapy Alone for People with Operable Pancreatic Cancer
- A Phase 1 Study of ASP2138 in People With Pancreatic Cancer or Stomach or Gastroesophageal Junction Cancer That Makes Claudin (CLDN) 18.2
- A Phase 3 Multicenter, Open-label, Randomized, 2-Arm Study of Adjuvant Daraxonrasib versus Standard of Care Observation Following Completion of Neoadjuvant and/or Adjuvant Chemotherapy in Patients with Resected Pancreatic Ductal Adenocarcinoma
- A Phase 1 Study of INCB161734 in People With Solid Tumors
- A Phase I Study of ASP3082 in People with Solid Tumors with KRAS G12D Mutations
- A Phase 1b/2 Study of RMC-6236 Plus Other Anti-Cancer Drugs (Chemotherapy, Targeted therapy, RMC-9805, and Others) in People With Advanced Digestive Tumors with KRAS Mutations
- A Study of Tislelizumab and SX-682 in People With Pancreas Cancer
- A Phase 1-2 Study of TNG462 Plus Other Medications in People With Pancreatic or Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer
- A Study of BNT329 in People With Solid Tumors
You can see a current listing of MSK’s clinical trials for pancreatic cancer below.
