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AACR 2026 | HPV head and neck cancer subtypes guide radiation and novel therapies

Wendell Yarbrough, MD, MMHC, FACS, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, discusses the differentiation of subtypes of HPV-associated head and neck cancer as a predictive tool for response to radiation therapy, suggesting that patients with good prognosis subtypes may be effectively treated with lower doses of radiation therapy combined with chemotherapy. Patients in high-risk subgroups may require alternative treatments, including strategies to sensitize tumors to radiation, such as activating NF-kappa B, as well as emerging immune therapies like dual-specificity antibodies and CAR-Ts. This interview took place at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Annual Meeting 2026 in San Diego, CA.

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Transcript

Yeah, I think that it does seem that this marker is a predictive marker. The subtypes are predictive for response to radiation. So one simple way to think about it is if you’re in the good prognosis subtype, you may be treated effectively with lower doses of radiation therapy combined with chemotherapy, even for aggressive appearing tumors based on stage or infiltration...

Yeah, I think that it does seem that this marker is a predictive marker. The subtypes are predictive for response to radiation. So one simple way to think about it is if you’re in the good prognosis subtype, you may be treated effectively with lower doses of radiation therapy combined with chemotherapy, even for aggressive appearing tumors based on stage or infiltration. But if you’re in the high-risk subgroup, then I think other treatments are what we need to explore. We mentioned activating NF-kappa B to sensitize those tumors to radiation, but there’s also a lot of other options for those tumor subtypes as well that they may need to have a better cure rate, including new emerging immune therapies, possibly dual-specificity antibodies, and even CAR T’s.

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