For patients and the public

 

Glo-BNHL is a trial for children, adolescents and young people with B-cell non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma (B-NHL) that does not go away (refractory B-NHL) or does but then comes back again (relapsed B-NHL).

Professor Amos Burke

Professor Amos Burke

“This clinical trial is a direct result of international cooperation between childhood cancer parent representatives, medical teams, pharmaceutical companies and independent drug regulators to test new treatments for children and young people with very difficult to treat B-cell lymphoma. Together we hope to speed up the availability of more effective treatments to prevent more children dying from this type of lymphoma.”

 

About the trial

The Glo-BNHL trial is trying to find better medicines for children and young people with B-cell Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma (B-NHL) that does not go away (refractory B-NHL) or does but then comes back again (relapsed B-NHL).

B-NHL is a type of cancer that develops inside or outside of lymph nodes (glands) and organs such as the liver or spleen. It is very difficult to cure children with relapsed or refractory B-NHL. The medicines used now are very powerful with many side effects and only cure around one in every three children treated. It is very important that we quickly find better medicines for these children.

Trial Design

The Glo-BNHL trial will include three groups of children and young people, each given a new medicine (either alone or with chemotherapy). We are looking to make sure the new medicines are safe and that they work to treat the cancer. If the medicine in one group does not work for a child in the trial, then they may be able to join a different group to have another new medicine.

Experts from around the world will carefully pick the medicines most likely to be helpful to be part of the trial. If one of the new medicines seems not to be working as well as hoped then we will take it out of the trial. This will let other new medicines be added to the trial to be tested. If a medicine does seem to be working well, then it will continue in the trial to make sure it really is the most useful medicine we have.

Children from around the world will be invited to take part in the trial. We will then check on them for at least two years to look for possible side effects of the new medicine.

Aims of the trial

  • Test the how well new medicines work to improve the outcomes of children, adolescents and young adults with relapsed or refractory B-NHL (alone or combined with existing treatments)
  • Test the safety of these new medicines in children, adolescents and young adults with relapsed or refractory B-NHL
  • Carry out biological studies to find out how and why some cancers are unaffected by treatment and find possible targets for new medicines

Who can take part?

Glo-BNHL is a trial for children and young people with B-cell Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma (B-NHL) that does not go away (refractory B-NHL) or does but then comes back again (relapsed B-NHL).  For detailed eligibility and exclusion criteria, please see the lay summary below.

How many patients will be recruited?

The trial is aiming to recruit up to 30 patients in each treatment arm. Some treatment arms may fill up faster than others. Once a treatment arm is full, a new medicine of the same type will take its place.

A group called the Trial Steering Committee will review the trial data at certain points, and may decide to pause recruitment, or remove a medicine, if it does not appear to be working to help the children in the trial. If this happens, a new medicine will replace it.

As the trial goes on, the research team may identify other types of treatment that they think may work for children with relapsed/refractory B-NHL. If this happens, new treatment arms could be added to the trial.

Documents (lay summary)