Excluding skin cancers, colorectal cancer is the third most common cancer diagnosed in both men and women in the United States. According to the American Cancer Society, in 2025, about 154,270 individuals were diagnosed with colorectal cancer, and approximately 53,000 individuals died from the...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted traditional approval to the chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy brexucabtagene autoleucel (Tecartus) for adult patients with relapsed or refractory mantle cell lymphoma (MCL). The full approval now includes efficacy, safety, and...
Fragments of tumor DNA circulating in the bloodstream of patients with breast cancer may predict whether they are likely to experience relapse—especially when samples are taken after the patients have received treatments prior to surgery. Findings presented at the 15th European Breast Cancer...
Researchers leading the LORD trial of active surveillance for ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) described early results as “reassuring” in a presentation to the 15th European Breast Cancer Conference (EBCC15) in Barcelona (Abstract 2LBA). People diagnosed with DCIS have abnormal cells inside the milk ...
Results from the OASIS 4 clinical trial showed that elinzanetant, a neurokinin-targeted therapy, relieved hot flashes and night sweats that can occur because of menopause or hormone treatment for breast cancer. These findings were published in June 2025 in The New England Journal of Medicine. Now,...
Patients with breast cancer may be able to avoid lymphedema, which can occur after surgery to remove lymph nodes in the axilla, by having radiotherapy instead. New findings, presented at the 15th European Breast Cancer Conference (EBCC15) in Barcelona, suggest that axillary radiotherapy may be as...
Last week, Dartmouth Cancer Center (DCC) and Fox Chase Cancer Center announced the appointments of new directors—both experts in the treatment of lung cancer. DCC has appointed Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, as the center’s sixth director. Temple Health announced the appointment of Robert A. Winn, MD, as...
In patients with CALR exon 9–mutated myelofibrosis who were resistant or intolerant to prior Janus kinase (JAK) inhibitor therapy, or ineligible for such treatment, the first-in-class mutant calreticulin–specific monoclonal antibody INCA033989, given as monotherapy or in combination with...
Last October, the Cancer AI Alliance (CAIA) announced the launch of its collaborative artificial intelligence (AI) platform powered by federated learning to train AI models with millions of de-identified patient datasets from participating cancer centers, while maintaining patient security,...
The promise of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to provide highly personalized oncology care for patients and improve outcomes has been decades in the making. In a 1987 editorial in The New England Journal of Medicine, pioneering nephrologist and health economist William B. Schwartz, MD,...
Applications are now being accepted for the 2026 Integrative Oncology Scholars Program and Integrative Oncology Fellows Program at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor (https://sites.google.com/view/integrative-oncology-scholars-/home). Now in its sixth year, the Integrative Oncology Scholars...
On October 1, 2025, Benjamin L. Ebert, MD, PhD, celebrated the 1-year anniversary of being named President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. He also holds the titles of Director of Dana-Farber/Harvard Cancer Center, the Richard and Susan Smith Professor of ...
ASCO has released a guideline update addressing advances in the use of immunotherapy and targeted therapy for the treatment of advanced gastroesophageal cancer.1 The guideline, last updated in 2023 to include first-line therapy recommendations for patients with biomarkers such as PD-L1 and HER2,...
Patients with leptomeningeal metastasis have historically had few treatment options. Now, researchers have found a combination of the tyrosine kinase inhibitor tucatinib and the monoclonal antibody trastuzumab, plus the chemotherapy capecitabine, may improve symptoms and extend survival in some...
Adding hormone therapy to postprostatectomy radiotherapy may provide little survival benefit for most men with prostate cancer, especially those with very low prostate-specific antigen (PSA) levels before treatment. In the study, reported at the 2026 ASCO Genitourinary Cancers Symposium,1 men with...
As the incidence of cancer among reproductive-age people continues to increase in the United States—with approximately one out of every 1,000 pregnancies complicated by cancer—the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine (SMFM) has issued its first evidence-based clinical guidance for diagnosing and...
A new analysis suggests that prostate cancer screening may compare favorably with screening for breast cancer in terms of identifying significant cancers, reducing mortality, and avoiding unnecessary harms, according to findings presented at the 2026 Annual Congress of the European Association of...
One in 10 patients who present to the emergency department with visible hematuria may die within 3 months, new research from the United Kingdom has indicated. The WASHOUT study, presented at the European Association of Urology Congress (EAU26) in London, found that a scan administered within 48...
The members of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) have elected Robert H. Vonderheide, MD, DPhil, as the AACR President-elect for 2026–2027. Dr. Vonderheide will become President-Elect on Monday, April 20, during AACR’s Annual Business Meeting of Members at the AACR Annual Meeting...
A novel KRAS G12D inhibitor produced disease control in almost 80% of patients with heavily pretreated advanced or metastatic KRAS G12D–mutated pancreatic cancer in an early-phase study reported at the 2026 ASCO Gastrointestinal Cancers Symposium. Of 41 evaluable patients treated with single-agent...
On March 10, 2000, it was a cold Friday morning in Washington, DC. As usual, we the oncology fellows and faculty crowded into a conference room at the NIH Clinical Center in Building 10 for our weekly conference. Before the session formally began, a senior faculty member walked in holding the New...
Women are more likely to survive cancer than men, but face a higher risk of serious and adverse side effects from treatment, according to a landmark international study. Published by Chhetri et al in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, the research identified consistent differences...
Based on results from the phase III KEYNOTE-564 study,1 adjuvant pembrolizumab is currently a standard of care for patients with clear cell renal cell carcinoma who have an increased risk of recurrence following a nephrectomy. Now, results from the phase III LITESPARK-022 study investigating the...
T-cell lymphomas are notoriously difficult to treat because immunotherapy, despite being one of the most effective therapies for treating cancer, can’t easily distinguish cancerous T cells from healthy ones. Now, scientists at The Wistar Institute have designed a two-vaccine approach that not only...
The 2025 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium (SABCS 2025) featured some exciting presentations. The early breast cancer highlights at SABCS 2025 included the landmark lidERA trial, which explored the efficacy of the oral selective estrogen receptor degrader (SERD) giredestrant in the adjuvant...
Building upon the foundation of liquid biopsy utility for the early detection of cancer, analysis of genome-wide cell-free DNA fragmentation with machine learning classification and modeling can also extend to the identification of liver cirrhosis and other chronic diseases, according to findings...
A novel KRAS G12D inhibitor produced disease control in almost 80% of patients with heavily pretreated advanced or metastatic KRAS G12D–mutated pancreatic cancer in an early-phase study reported at the 2026 ASCO Gastrointestinal (GI) Cancers Symposium.1 Of 41 evaluable patients treated with...
Findings from the American Cancer Society's triennial report, Colorectal Cancer Statistics, 2026, show that rates of colorectal cancer are decreasing in older adults; however, rates of colorectal cancer incidence in younger adults continue to increase, with a greater proportion of these cancers...
In 2015, LH, a 66-year-old female, was diagnosed with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), Rai stage 0. Untreated, the woman’s lymphocyte count rose from 5,000/mm3 to 16,000/mm3 in 6 years (doubling time = 4.2 years). She was then advised to stop eating red meat (see the figure). Commercially...
Advanced-stage follicular lymphoma is currently considered incurable. But a new analysis of long-term data from patients treated for the disease years ago with standard regimens of immunotherapy and a chemotherapy combination known as CHOP suggests that many of those patients can now be considered...
Based on the results from the phase III KEYNOTE-564 study, adjuvant pembrolizumab is currently standard of care for patients with clear cell renal cell carcinoma at increased risk of recurrence following a nephrectomy. Now, the results from the phase III LITESPARK-022 study—which investigated the...
Among the high-quality abstract presentations at the annual San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium (SABCS), a few always stand out as particularly meritorious. Each year, The ASCO Post asks its Senior Deputy Editor, breast cancer specialist Jame Abraham, MD, FACP, to offer his top picks for most...
Each year in the United States, about 90,000 adolescents and young adults (AYAs), ages 15 to 39, are diagnosed with cancer,1 and they are immediately faced with myriad challenges and disruptions in their life stages, including psychosocial distress; interruptions in their education, career, and...
A year ago, I was confronting a series of symptoms—including rapid weight loss, abdominal distress, fatigue, and heart issues—that I couldn’t explain. I was just 60 years old and had been in good health, but now I sensed that something was seriously wrong. I made appointments with my primary care...
The oncology community is mourning the loss of Paul E. Goss, MD, PhD, FRCPC, FRCP, who died on December 19, 2025, at his home in Hopkinton, Massachusetts, from multiple system atrophy—a rare, progressive neurologic disorder with symptoms resembling those of Parkinson’s disease. He was 70 years ...
In February, ASCO and Conexiant launched ASCO AI in Oncology (ascoai.org), a digital platform dedicated to understanding how artificial intelligence (AI) is impacting cancer care. “Our goal with this hub is to empower oncology professionals with knowledge and the tools to adapt to a rapidly...
ASCO has published an updated guideline on systemic therapy for patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC), representing ASCO’s first Living Guideline in the area of prostate cancer and the first in any genitourinary (GU) cancer.1 “Guidelines will become less useful if...
The addition of the BRAF inhibitor encorafenib and the EGFR antibody cetuximab to chemotherapy with FOLFIRI (leucovorin, fluorouracil, and irinotecan) in the first-line treatment of BRAF V600E–mutated metastatic colorectal cancer led to a significant improvement in overall response rate—compared...
Pfizer has announced positive topline progression-free survival results from cohort 3, a separate randomized cohort of the pivotal BREAKWATER trial, evaluating encorafenib in combination with cetuximab and FOLFIRI (fluorouracil, leucovorin, and irinotecan) in patients with previously untreated...
Treatment with a single injection of an oncolytic virus induces persistent T cell–mediated immunity in glioblastoma, according to findings from a trial published in Cell. “Patients with glioblastoma have not benefited from immunotherapies that have transformed patient care in other cancer types...
The first-in-human clinical trial of an in vivo CAR T-cell therapy for multiple myeloma has shown encouraging clinical outcomes at an early time point, with a safety profile and ease of administration that indicates the off-the-shelf KLN-1010 could be easily deployable, researchers from Australia...
In patients with CALR exon 9–mutated myelofibrosis who were resistant or intolerant to prior Janus kinase (JAK) inhibitor therapy or ineligible for such treatment, the first-in-class mutant calreticulin–specific monoclonal antibody INCA033989 as monotherapy or in combination with ruxolitinib...
As front-line therapy, a chemotherapy-free regimen combining the tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) ponatinib and the bispecific T-cell engager blinatumomab significantly outperformed standard treatment with imatinib plus chemotherapy in adults with newly diagnosed Philadelphia chromosome–positive...
At this year’s American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition in Orlando, we had the opportunity to navigate both manned and unmanned traffic, contend with temperamental weather, and count our steps as we took in the most consequential developments in hematologic oncology....
For patients with previously treated multiple myeloma, the greatest risk reduction yet achieved in a phase III clinical trial was reported with the BCMA-directed CD3 T-cell engager teclistamab-cqyv plus daratumumab and hyaluronidase-fihj. Treatment with this combination resulted in an 83% reduction ...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has provided communication to increase awareness of recent updates to the product labeling of capecitabine (Xeloda) and fluorouracil—indicated for colorectal, breast, gastric/esophageal/gastroesophageal, and pancreatic cancers—related to risks associated...
As the organizer of World Cancer Day on February 4, the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC) is mobilizing organizations and individuals worldwide to ensure that the voices of people affected by cancer are heard and drive a new vision of cancer care. Now in its second year, the World...
The use of oxybutynin led to statistically significant reductions in the number of hot flashes per day compared with placebo for men with prostate cancer receiving androgen-deprivation therapy (ADT), according to findings from the Alliance A222001 trial published in the Journal of Clinical...
The first prospective, randomized phase III trial of a noncovalent Bruton’s tyrosine kinase (BTK) inhibitor exclusively in treatment-naive patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL)/small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL)—BRUIN CLL-313—demonstrated a statistically significant and clinically...
A response-adapted approach to treatment decision-making for patients with resectable cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma demonstrated that with the use of neoadjuvant pembrolizumab, many patients could avoid surgery and/or radiotherapy. Findings from the De-Squamate study were published in the...