Biomarker context-of-use: how organizational design can impact the implementation of the appropriate biomarker assay strategy

Re-thinking the current paradigm for clinical immunogenicity assessment: an update from the discussion in the European Bioanalysis Forum

Immunogenicity regulatory guidance and industry recommendations have evolved over the last two decades since unexpected immune reactions were first reported with erythropoietin. Since then, the guidelines and practices for immunogenicity have stemmed from a reaction to a high-risk molecule causing significant clinical impact. Similar thinking is often applied to all biotherapeutic drugs, even when a well-defined risk assessment suggests otherwise. In recent years, the current testing paradigm for immunogenicity has been challenged with more informative approaches being proposed. In a Focus Workshop held by the European Bioanalysis Forum in September 2023, the current immunogenicity testing paradigm was challenged based on the experience and learning of 20+ years of immunogenicity strategies. The workshop recommendations proposed a new paradigm, challenging the value of multiple tiers depending on the immunogenicity risk assessment based on context of use and moving toward treating immunogenicity as a pharmacodynamic biomarker for the drug. Such rethinking ultimately results in the appropriate and efficient focusing of resources on immunogenicity testing strategies that benefit patients most, moving to a new paradigm where implementation of appropriate and truly informative immunogenicity testing strategies, depending on the context-of-use, become the norm .

The European Bioanalysis Forum recommendation on establishing appropriate drug tolerance levels in antidrug antibody assays

The European Bioanalysis Forum, in collaboration with several key industry stakeholders, has recently led discussions that address international immunogenicity guidance documents, specifically the three tier approach for immunogenicity testing strategies, after more than 20 years of experience with biotherapeutics. As part of this, the strategy and methods used to assess drug tolerance across all immunogenicity assays are challenged, emphasizing that bioanalytical scientists need to consider the context-of-use of each assay. Here, recommendations for drug tolerance assessments, driven by strong scientific rationale and subject to reevaluation as needed, are provided. This includes carefully considering the drug and positive control concentrations considered to be appropriate and which tiers are most relevant for performing drug tolerance assessments.

A European Bioanalysis Forum recommendation for requiring a context-of-use statement for successful development and validation of biomarker assays

The European Bioanalysis Forum, alongside key industry stakeholders, has been driving the discussions around the implementation of context-of use for biomarker assays to ensure that these assays are validated appropriately depending on their purpose. Insights into understanding why the implementation of context-of-use in assay strategies has also shown that the key stakeholder, or requester for the biomarker data, is responsible for providing the context-of-use statement for all biomarker assay requests. Experts from across the industry haves repeatedly sought a cross-industry recommended format in which the context-of-use statement could be provided. In this manuscript, the European Bioanalysis Forum suggests a format for this.

A novel biomarker assay qualification strategy for rare human matrices - a case study of biomarkers in aqueous humor

Background: Measuring pharmacodynamic biomarkers near the therapeutic site of action presents considerable challenges for sites with limited matrix volume or difficult access. Bioanalytical method qualification requires the use of numerous matrix samples, which is problematic for rare matrices. The aim of this study was to design and implement a streamlined, fit-for-purpose strategy for qualification of biomarker assays in rare matrices. Materials & methods: A multiplexed biomarker immunoassay was developed in human aqueous humor. Results: Our strategy was successfully implemented, providing characterization of assay performance while reducing number of samples in assay qualification. Our assay was used in clinical trial support for an ophthalmic drug candidate. Conclusion: Our results indicate this approach can be applied to other early stage drug development programs facing similar challenges.

A biomarker assay validation approach tailored to the context of use and bioanalytical platform

It is widely acknowledged by the bioanalytical and biomarker community that biomarker assay validations should be fit-for-purpose depending on the context of use. The challenge is how to consistently apply these principles in teams responsible for measuring a disparate array of biomarkers, often on multiple analytical platforms, at various stages of the drug discovery and development pipeline and across diverse biology focus areas. To drive consistency, while maintaining the necessary flexibility to allow validations to be driven by scientific rationale and taking into consideration the context of use and associated biological and (pre)analytical factors, a framework applicable across biomarker assays was developed. Herein the authors share their perspective to engage in the ongoing conversation around fit-for-purpose biomarker assay validation.

Feedback from the 8th European Bioanalysis Forum Young Scientist Symposium

After 2 years of COVID-19 restrictions, the 8th Young Scientist Symposium was organized again as a face-to-face meeting covering a broad array of scientific presentations. As in the previous editions, the meeting was organized by young scientists for young scientists under the umbrella of the European Bioanalysis Forum and in collaboration with academia. The traditional Science Café was again included as an interactive round table session. This year, the main focus was on the challenges of communication. New for the 8th edition was a session connecting the young scientists with more seasoned experts in an effort to bridge talent and experience. In this article, we share the feedback of the scientific sessions and the Science Café held at the symposium.