Blood & Cancer

Think of biosimilars as your mother’s minestrone soup: It’s the same recipe and ingredients every time, but not every batch is chemically identical, even if it tastes about the same. That’s how Brian T. Hill, MD, PhD, of the Cleveland Clinic, describes biosimilars. He joins Blood & Cancer host David H. Henry, MD, of Pennsylvania Hospital, Philadelphia, to discuss how biosimilars are made and approved, and how they differ from generic drugs.  In Clinical Correlation, Ilana Yurkiewicz, MD, of Stanford (Calif.) University, talks about percentages -- what they mean, what they don’t mean, and how they can be interpreted in oncology.  * * * What are biosimilars? Monoclonal antibodies and biologics are complex and large proteins that are made in cells and bioreactors. Because they are made in “nature” instead of a synthetic reaction (discussed with generics), slight differences can be expected in the molecular structure.  Those slight variances do not create clinically meaningful differences between the biosimi