Boston University - Clinical & Translational Science Institute

This study is designed to assess the safety and efficacy of lenvatinib in combination with pembrolizumab versus standard of care (SOC) chemotherapy, and to also assess the safety and efficacy of lenvatinib monotherapy in participants with recurrent/metastatic head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (R/M HNSCC) that have progressed after platinum therapy and a programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1) or anti-programmed death ligand 1 (PD-L1) inhibitor. The primary hypothesis is that lenvatinib + pembrolizumab is superior to SOC chemotherapy with respect to ORR per modified Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors (RECIST) 1.1 as assessed by blinded independent central review.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Aug 2020

open study

Acute Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) is a rare injury that leads to permanent neuromotor impairment and sudden disability. Approximately 25,000 people experience cervical SCI in the United States, Europe, and Japan every year. The purpose of this study is to see if elezanumab is safe and assess change in Upper Extremity Motor Score (UEMS) in participants with acute traumatic cervical SCI. Elezanumab is an investigational drug being developed for the treatment of SCI. Elezanumab is a monoclonal antibody, that binds to an inhibitor of neuronal regeneration and neutralizes the inhibitor, thus potentially promoting neuroregeneration. This study is "double-blinded", which means that neither trial participants nor the study doctors will know who will be given which study drug. Study doctors put the participants in 1 of 2 groups, called treatment arms. Each group receives a different treatment. There is a 1 in 3 chance that participants will be assigned to placebo. Participants 18-75 years of age with a SCI will be enrolled. Approximately 54 participants will be enrolled in the study in approximately 49 sites worldwide. Participants will receive intravenous (IV) doses of elezanumab or placebo within 24 hours of injury and every 4 weeks thereafter through Week 48 for a total of 13 doses. There may be a higher treatment burden for participants in this trial compared to their standard of care. Participants will attend regular visits during the course of the study at a hospital or clinic. The effect of the treatment will be checked by medical assessments, blood tests, checking for side effects and completing questionnaires.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Sep 2020

open study

This phase III trial studies magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) surveillance and prophylactic cranial irradiation (PCI) to see how well they work compared to MRI surveillance alone in treating patients with small cell lung cancer. MRI scans are used to monitor the possible spread of the cancer with an MRI machine over time. PCI is radiation therapy that is delivered to the brain in hopes of preventing spread of cancer into the brain. The use of brain MRI alone may reduce side effects of receiving PCI and prolong patients' lifespan. Monitoring with MRI scans alone (delaying radiation until the actual spread of the cancer) may be at least as good as the combination of PCI with MRI scans.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: May 2020

open study

This phase I trial studies the side effect and best dose of ibrutinib in combination with rituximab, etoposide, prednisone, vincristine sulfate, cyclophosphamide, and doxorubicin hydrochloride in treating patients with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-positive stage II-IV diffuse large B-cell lymphomas. Ibrutinib may stop the growth of cancer cells by blocking some of the enzymes needed for cell growth. Monoclonal antibodies, such as rituximab, may interfere with the ability of cancer cells to grow and spread. Drugs used in chemotherapy, such as etoposide, prednisone, vincristine sulfate, cyclophosphamide, and doxorubicin hydrochloride, work in different ways to stop the growth of cancer cells, either by killing the cells, by stopping them from dividing, or by stopping them from spreading. Giving ibrutinib and etoposide, prednisone, vincristine sulfate, cyclophosphamide, and doxorubicin hydrochloride may work better in treating patients with HIV-positive diffuse large B-cell lymphomas.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Mar 2018

open study

Heavy alcohol use among college students is associated with a range of negative consequences. However, college students rarely seek resources or treatment to change their alcohol use. Brief alcohol interventions (BAIs) have been developed as an alternative method to address heavy alcohol use among college students and show promise in reducing hazardous alcohol use in college students. Despite the established efficacy of BAIs, effects are often small and short-lived, and additional research is needed to investigate how BAIs can become more efficacious and endure for longer periods of time, particularly for computer-delivered interventions to improve accessibility and scalability of these interventions to a wider range of college students. Boosters or adjunctive components to BAIs have been suggested as a method to enhance the magnitude and duration of intervention effects. However, there remains a need to identify and test booster approaches that are both appealing and engaging to college students and effective in reducing heavy/hazardous alcohol use above and beyond the magnitude and duration seen by BAIs alone. The purpose of the study is to develop and test a novel, text-messaging booster as an adjunct to a current, evidence-based brief intervention, eCHECKUP TO GO, aimed at reducing college student heavy/hazardous alcohol use. Participants will complete baseline measures and will then be randomized to 1 of 3 conditions, stratified by sex at birth: 1) assessment only, 2) BAI only, and 3) Enhanced Intervention (BAI + four weeks of text messaging boosters). It is hypothesized that those randomized to the enhanced intervention condition will show a greater reduction in heavy/hazardous alcohol use at 3-month follow-up compared to the BAI and assessment only groups.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Mar 2024

open study

Common variable immunodeficiency (CVID) is the most prevalent symptomatic primary immunodeficiency. Respiratory ailments are the most frequent complications of CVID, with chronic pulmonary disease developing in 30-60% and even more experiencing frequent acute respiratory infections. This project aims to establish cutting-edge approaches to study pulmonary biology in CVID and apply novel bioinformatics strategies to study complex interactions among microbes and host cells by direct sampling of the respiratory tract. The central hypothesis for this research is that antibody (Ab) deficiency in CVID alters respiratory microbiota and host interactions to drive pulmonary disease.

Type: Observational

Start Date: Mar 2024

open study

The goal of this clinical study is to learn how safe and effective it is to switch to an oral therapy of Bictegravir/Emtricitabine/Tenofovir (B/F/TAF) from Cabotegravir + Rilpivirine (CAB+RPV) in participants living with virologically suppressed human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1), meaning participants with HIV RNA levels below detectable levels. The primary objective of this study is to assess the safety of switching to B/F/TAF in virologically suppressed participants unable/unwilling to continue on CAB+RPV intramuscular (IM) injections or wishing to switch to oral therapy through Week 12.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Dec 2023

open study

Many youth are addicted to nicotine due to increased nicotine vaping (e.g., e-cigarettes). Unfortunately, there are no effective interventions to help teens quit vaping. In addition, existing vaping prevention programs have limited effectiveness because they are out of touch with teen's culture and are not appealing to the intended audience. Therefore, to be effective, a vaping intervention must be acceptable, appealing, and engaging to teens, and most importantly, it should be designed to be channeled into an existing infrastructure such as the school setting. The investigators' research group has designed a vaping prevention and cessation intervention that is implemented as a VR game for high school teens. The overall objective of this research is to assess the acceptability, feasibility, and preliminary efficacy of the VR experience among high school students in high school in Boston.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Apr 2024

open study

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the efficacy and safety of adjuvant autogene cevumeran plus atezolizumab and modified leucovorin, 5-fluorouracil (5-FU), irinotecan, and oxaliplatin (mFOLFIRINOX) versus mFOLFIRINOX alone in participants with resected pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) who have not received prior systemic anti-cancer treatment for PDAC and have no evidence of disease after surgery.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Oct 2023

open study

The phase III trial compares the effect of pembrolizumab to observation for the treatment of patients with early-stage triple-negative breast cancer who achieved a pathologic complete response after preoperative chemotherapy in combination with pembrolizumab. Immunotherapy with monoclonal antibodies, such as pembrolizumab, may help the body's immune system attack the cancer, and may interfere with the ability of tumor cells to grow and spread. This trial may help researchers determine if observation will result in the same risk of cancer coming back as pembrolizumab after surgery in triple-negative breast cancer patients who achieve pathologic complete response after preoperative chemotherapy with pembrolizumab.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: May 2023

open study

This randomized clinical trial will evaluate the effect of tonabersat compared with placebo on central subfield thickness (CST) in eyes with center-involved diabetic macular edema (CI-DME) and good visual acuity.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: May 2023

open study

This phase II trial compares the effect of irinotecan versus oxaliplatin after long-course chemoradiation in patients with stage II-III rectal cancer. Combination chemotherapy drugs, such as FOLFIRINOX (fluorouracil, irinotecan, leucovorin, and oxaliplatin), FOLFOX (leucovorin, fluorouracil, oxaliplatin, and irinotecan ), and CAPOX (capecitabin and oxaliplatin) work in different ways to stop the growth of tumor cells, either by killing the cells, by stopping them from dividing, or by stopping them from spreading. FOLFOX or CAPOX are used after chemoradiation as usual treatment for rectal cancer. Giving FOLFIRINOX after chemoradiation may increase the response rate and lead to higher rates of clinical complete response (with a chance of avoiding surgery) compared to FOLFOX or CAPOX after chemoradiation in patients with locally advanced rectal cancer.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Dec 2022

open study

The main purpose of this study is to assess the efficacy and safety of LY3540378 in adults with worsening heart failure with preserved ejection fraction

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Feb 2023

open study

PE-TRACT is an open-label, assessor-blinded, randomized trial, aiming to compare catheter-directed therapy (CDT) and anticoagulation (CDT group) with anticoagulation alone (No-CDT) in 500 patients with submassive PE, proximal pulmonary artery thrombus and right ventricular dilation.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Jul 2023

open study

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the safety, tolerability, and efficacy of mavacamten compared with placebo in participants with symptomatic non-obstructive hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (nHCM).

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Dec 2022

open study

The purpose of this study is to compare the efficacy of teclistamab with PVd/Kd.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Mar 2023

open study

This is a multicenter, randomized study to evaluate the long-term efficacy and safety of ABX464 50mg and 25mg administered once daily (QD) as maintenance therapy in subjects with moderately to severely active ulcerative colitis who have inadequate response, no response, a loss of response, or an intolerance to either conventional therapies [corticosteroids, immunosuppressant (i.e. azathioprine, 6-mercaptopurine, methotrexate)] and/or advanced therapies [biologics (TNF inhibitors, anti-integrins, anti-IL-23), and/or S1P receptor modulators, and/or JAK inhibitors]. This study is the maintenance phase of both previous induction studies ABX464-105 and ABX464-106. All eligible subjects who have completed either one of the induction studies above mentioned, will be given the opportunity to take part in the present ABX464-107 maintenance study and will be randomized to either a double blind, placebo-controlled part (Part #1) or allocated to ABX464 50mg or 25mg open label treatment arms (Part #2) depending on their clinical response at the end of induction. This study consists of a 44-week treatment phase and a 28-days follow-up period consisting in the End of Study (EOS) visit.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Jan 2023

open study

The purpose of this study is to assess the anti-tumor activity and safety of amivantamab which will be administered as a co-formulation with recombinant human hyaluronidase PH20 (rHuPH20) (subcutaneous co-formulation [SC-CF]) in combination treatment (all cohorts except Cohort 4) and to characterize the safety of amivantamab SC-CF (Cohort 4).

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Nov 2022

open study

The purpose of the study is to find out if the investigational treatment named QUC398 has beneficial effects on osteoarthritis knee pain and knee cartilage, and if it is safe and well tolerated.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Nov 2022

open study

The purpose of the study is to compare the efficacy of talquetamab subcutaneous(ly) (SC) in combination with daratumumab SC and pomalidomide (Tal-DP) and talquetamab SC in combination with daratumumab SC (Tal-D), respectively, with daratumumab SC in combination with pomalidomide and dexamethasone (DPd).

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Oct 2022

open study

In this study, researchers will learn more about a study drug called BIIB122 in participants with early-stage Parkinson's disease (PD). In this study: - Participants will take 225 milligrams (mg) of BIIB122 or a placebo as tablets by mouth. A placebo looks like the study drug but has no real medicine in it. - Participants will take BIIB122 or placebo 1 time a day for up to a minimum of 48 weeks and a maximum of 144 weeks. - Certain medications for PD will be allowed at enrollment for a subset of participants. - Participants will have to visit at 2-week intervals between baseline and week 12 and at 4-week intervals between week 12 and week 48 and at 12 week intervals between week 48 and week 144. The main question researchers are trying to answer is if taking BIIB122 slows the worsening of symptoms more than placebo in the early stages of PD. To help answer this question, researchers will use a questionnaire called the Movement Disorder Society-Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale, also known as the MDS-UPDRS. Researchers will use the MDS-UPDRS to learn about participant PD symptoms and how they affect their daily life. Researchers will also learn more about the safety of BIIB122.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Apr 2022

open study

The purpose of this study is to characterize cardiac safety of Daratumumab, Cyclophosphamide, Bortezomib, and Dexamethasone (D-VCd) treatment regimens (Arm A: daratumumab + immediate VCd treatment and Arm B: daratumumab + deferred VCd) in newly diagnosed systemic amyloid light chain (AL) amyloidosis with cardiac involvement and to identify potential mitigation strategies for cardiac toxicity (cohort 1); to characterize the pharmacokinetics of subcutaneous (SC) daratumumab, among racial and ethnic minorities, including Black or African American, with newly diagnosed AL amyloidosis treated with D-VCd (cohort 2).

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Mar 2022

open study

This phase II trial compares capecitabine and temozolomide to lutetium Lu 177 dotatate for the treatment of pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors that have spread to other parts of the body (advanced) or are not able to be removed by surgery (unresectable). Chemotherapy drugs, such as capecitabine and temozolomide, work in different ways to stop the growth of tumor cells, either by killing the cells, by stopping them from dividing, or by stopping them from spreading. Radioactive drugs, such as lutetium Lu 177 dotatate, may carry radiation directly to tumor cells and may reduce harm to normal cells. The purpose of this study is to find out whether capecitabine and temozolomide or lutetium Lu 177 dotatate may kill more tumor cells in patients with advanced pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors.

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Mar 2022

open study

Children exposed to HIV in-utero but uninfected (CHEUs) number 14.8 million globally. In Zambia, an estimated 56,000 CHEUs are born annually, a staggering fraction of the national birth cohort. Multiple studies establish that CHEUs are more neurodevelopmentally vulnerable than HIV-unexposed peers. In Zambia, there are existing effective early childhood developmental (ECD) interventions that target other vulnerable populations, but never trialed specifically for CHEUs. Scaling up ECD is now a priority of Zambia's national strategy, but CHEUs are not currently targeted. There is a need to better understand the scope and mechanism of CHEU-related neurodevelopmental differences and what interventions are most effective. This randomized clinical trial (RCT) is a true effectiveness trial as the intervention will deploy a home-based adaptation of the same curriculum that is currently used elsewhere in the country, named Scaling Up Early Childhood Development In Zambia (SUPERCDZ). The effectiveness of a scalable early childhood development (ECD) intervention for CHEUs will be evaluated using normalized Z-scores of neurodevelopmental testing at age 24 months. In this RCT the investigators will test the following hypotheses: Hypothesis 1: An ECD intervention delivered by community health workers via bi-weekly home visits will improve neurodevelopmental outcomes in CHEUs. Hypothesis 2: CHEUs have significantly worse neurodevelopmental outcomes than unexposed peers at 24 months, mediated by preterm birth, disease stage or antiretroviral (ARV) exposure. This RCT will build on an existent, actively recruiting cohort of 1500 pregnant women-infant dyads in a peri-urban hospital in Zambia, the Zambian Infant Cohort Study (ZICS), by extending the follow-up of a subsample of infants from 6 months to 2 years amongst the last 525 children enrolled (ZICS-BOOST- Brains Optimized to Survive and Thrive). The study will have three arms: Arm 1) CHEU + ECD intervention (n=175); Arm 2) CHEU without ECD intervention (n=175); Arm 3) HUU without intervention (n=175).

Type: Interventional

Start Date: Apr 2022

open study

The objectives of this research are to determine: - the burden of intestinal parasitic infections among persons living with pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) - whether intestinal parasitic infections alter TB treatment outcomes, including speed of sputum clearance and treatment outcomes - the impact of malnutrition on speed of sputum clearance and TB treatment outcomes - whether nutritional supplementation improves speed of sputum clearance and treatment outcomes In this study the researchers will investigate how intestinal parasites impact the nutritional status of TB patients before the start of nutritional supplementation and how they alter the trajectory of weight gain in those receiving supplementation by analyzing results from 2 cohorts. LEOPARD Cohort 1- - Control-Enroll TB cases, screen for undernutrition, obtain stool for intestinal parasite screening by polymerase chain reaction (PCR), and assess them for treatment outcomes and weight gain - TB LION (Learning Impact of Nutrition) - Enroll TB cases, provide nutritional supplementation for 6 months (as part of existing TB LION study), screen for undernutrition, obtain stool for intestinal parasite screening by PCR, and assess them for treatment outcomes and weight gain LEOPARD Cohort 2 - - Enroll TB cases, screen for undernutrition, obtain stool for internal parasite screening by PCR, and assess them for treatment outcomes and weight gain.

Type: Observational

Start Date: Apr 2022

open study