Zevalin™: Treatment of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma

Ibritumomab is the murine parent anti-CD20 antibody that was engineered to make the human chimeric antibody rituximab. Tiuxetan is a MX-DTPA chelator that is linked to ibritumomab to form Zevalin (ibritumomab tiuxetan). Zevalin can be reacted with 111-Indium (¹¹¹In) to form ¹¹¹In-Zevalin which is used for imaging and dosimetry, or with 90-Yttrium (⁹⁰Y) to form ⁹⁰Y-Zevalin which is used for therapy of patients with relapsed B-cell non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. Its advantages are single-dose, outpatient, preservation of quality of life and excellent patient tolerance. Future trials are needed to define the optimal time in the disease course where this modality should be used and how it can be combined with other therapies to maximize tumor response. This review discusses the clinical trials that demonstrated the efficacy of Zevalin and led to its FDA approval in February, 2002.