Corticosteroid premedication and the antitumor effect of immune checkpoint blockade in murine hepatocellular carcinoma models. Corticosteroid premedication and the antitumor effect of immune checkpoint blockade in murine hepatocellular carcinoma models

This study aims to investigate whether corticosteroid premedication may compromise antitumor efficacy of dual ICB, a regimen that may cause significant irAEs. The results signal a green light for further clinical investigations using corticosteroid premedication to prevent dICB-induced irAEs. Overall design: Subcutaneous Hepa1-6 and orthotopic BNL 1MEA.7R.1 syngeneic HCC models were used. Low-dose (LD; 10 μg) or high-dose (HD; 200 μg) dexamethasone (Dexa) was intraperitoneally administered before each dose of anti-CTLA-4 and anti-PD-1. Tumor shrinkage, T cell priming, cytokine quantitation, as well as cytotoxicity and single-cell RNA-sequencing (scRNA-seq) of tumor-infiltrating T cells were assessed.