The Impact of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease on Immune Checkpoint Inhibitor Effectiveness in Non-small Cell Lung Cancer: A Population Health Study

Summary: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and lung cancer are associated diseases. COPD confers a negative prognosis in NSCLC, but the clinical benefit of immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICI) in this population is unclear. A population-level analysis of patients in Ontario, Canada was performed through the ICES (formerly known as the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences) administrative database. Patients with NSCLC and treated with PD-1/PD-L1 immune checkpoint inhibitors between Jan 2010 and Dec 2020 were included. Overall survival (OS) was estimated using the Kaplan-Meier method and compared using Cox proportional hazards regression. Hospitalizations and duration of treatment were compared secondarily using logistic and linear regression. A total of 4306 patients received ICI and 54% of patients had a diagnosis of COPD. Median (95% CI) OS was 9.2 (8.5–9.9) months for patients with COPD and 8.2 (7.3–8.8) for patients without COPD, which was not significantly different (adjusted hazard ratio (aHR) = 0.94, 95% CI, 0.87–1.01, P = 0.092). Similarly, the median time on treatment was not different (85 vs. 99 days, multivariable P = 0.10). However, the 90-day hospitalization rate was decreased in the COPD population (multivariable odds ratio 0.76, 95% CI 0.62–0.94, P = 0.011). Among patients with NSCLC receiving ICI, our data suggest that a diagnosis of COPD does not result in shortened treatment, poorer survival, or higher rates of hospitalization. COPD itself should not be considered a contraindication to ICI.