Adherence to antiemetic guidelines for the prevention of chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting has been shown to improve patient outcomes. However, a new study suggests that physicians are still struggling to reach attainable adherence targets in antiemetic prophylaxis.1 According to data...
A smartphone application utilizing elements of artificial intelligence was associated with improved cancer pain outcomes and a significant reduction in pain-related hospital admissions, according to data presented at the 2018 Palliative and Supportive Care in Oncology Symposium.1 Results of the...
“The data are in, and they are clear and convincing. Palliative care leads to better outcomes for patients. The major challenge now is to make it part of standard cancer care everywhere in the United States and then everywhere else in the world, said Charles von Gunten, MD, PhD, a medical...
Padmanee Sharma, MD, PhD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, has been recognized for her contributions to the field of immuno-oncology with the Pandolfi Award for Women in Cancer Research at the 11th Annual Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Cancer Symposium. Dr. Sharma was...
Cancer is the leading cause of disease-related childhood death. To better serve the special needs of this highly vulnerable patient population, pediatric palliative care teams use a personalized, holistic, and interdisciplinary approach tailored to relieve the physical, psychosocial, and spiritual ...
Pathologic complete response after neoadjuvant chemotherapy was associated with a significantly lower recurrence risk and higher overall survival in patients with breast cancer, and pathologic complete response after neoadjuvant chemotherapy had a similar association with improved outcomes...
The 20th Annual Lynn Sage Breast Cancer Symposium was hosted earlier this year by the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center of Northwestern University in Chicago. “A new era of cancer vaccines” and encouraging data from early trials were among the topics discussed by Mary (Nora) Disis, MD...
“We are on the cusp of a new way to treat breast cancer,” Mary L. (Nora) Disis, MD, said in summarizing advances using immunology to treat breast cancer. Immune checkpoint inhibitors, adaptive T-cell therapies, and vaccines can enlist and rev up the immune system and be combined with chemotherapy...
Finance is a key driver in cancer prevention, as has been evidenced by the influence of tax on the consumption of products such as cigarettes and alcohol. Going up against a huge industry like Big Tobacco will almost certainly be met with tremendous opposition, but understanding the industrial...
The global burden of cancer-related suffering is tremendously unbalanced, according to Eric L. Krakauer, MD, PhD, Director of the Global Palliative Care Program at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston and a lead coauthor of the Report of the Lancet Commission on Global...
As the global burden of cancer grows, cancer control measures must be tailored to regional and national priorities, underscoring the need for high-quality cancer registries, according to Christopher P. Wild, PhD, Director of the International Agency for Research on Cancer in Lyon, France. Earlier...
On October 16, 2018, the poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor talazoparib (Talzenna) was approved for the treatment of patients with deleterious or suspected deleterious germline BRCA-mutated, HER2-negative locally advanced or metastatic breast cancer.1,2 Patients must be selected for...
Investigators from Australia have identified a genetic mutation that causes resistance to the targeted drug venetoclax (Venclexta) in patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), according to research presented by Blombery et al at the 2018 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting...
On August 16, 2018, lenvatinib (Lenvima) was approved for the first-line treatment of patients with unresectable hepatocellular carcinoma.1,2 Supporting Efficacy Data Approval was based on the findings of a phase III open-label noninferiority trial (REFLECT), in which 954 patients with previously...
Researchers, patients with cancer, and philanthropists have come together to launch Count Me In, a nonprofit organization aimed at patient-partnered research. Count Me In allows patients with cancer anywhere in the United States or Canada to easily share their medical information, personal...
Treating patients with early-stage triple-negative breast cancer with capecitabine after surgery and standard chemotherapy did not significantly improve disease-free or overall survival compared with observation, according to data from the randomized, phase III GEICAM/CIBOMA clinical trial...
Shaji K. Kumar, MD, of the Mayo Clinic, discusses phase III findings on daratumumab plus lenalidomide and dexamethasone vs lenalidomide and dexamethasone in people with newly diagnosed multiple myeloma who are ineligible for transplant (Abstract LBA2).
Interim results from a large international phase III clinical trial show that adding the immunotherapy daratumumab (Darzalex) to standard therapy significantly extended progression-free survival (PFS) in newly diagnosed patients with multiple myeloma who were ineligible for a stem cell transplant....
A new study suggests taking a direct oral anticoagulant (DOAC) can reduce the risk of harmful blood clots in patients undergoing cancer treatments, without substantially increasing the risk of bleeding problems. Findings from the CASSINI trial were presented by Khorana et al at the 2018 American...
According to findings from the ADAM VTE trial, an oral drug, apixaban (Eliquis), is safe and effective in treating blood clots in patients undergoing cancer therapy. The drug was associated with fewer major bleeding events and fewer recurrent blood clots compared to low–molecular-weight. ...
A follow-up analysis of patients enrolled in the multicenter ZUMA-1 trial for diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) showed axicabtagene ciloleucel can induce durable responses, yield a median overall survival of more than 2 years, and has a manageable long-term safety profile. Axicabtagene...
Researchers used machine learning to develop a new system to analyze genomic and clinical data to provide a personalized overall outcome that is patient-specific in myelodysplastic syndromes. In tests, the system outperformed the current standard prognostic tool, suggesting the new model may offer...
A new study demonstrated it is feasible for health-care providers to determine which molecular subtype of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) a patient has before beginning treatment and to use this information to pick an approach that best matches the individual. The results, presented by Burd et al at...
In a new study presented by Summers et al at the 2018 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition (Abstract 967), patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) who received a first stem cell transplant after CD19 chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy were less...
CD19-directed chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy has been shown to be effective in patients with relapsed B-cell acute lymphocytic leukemia (B-ALL). However, in some patients, the antitumor effects of CAR T-cell treatment are short-lived, which may, in part, be caused by a reaction of...
In the phase III MEDALIST clinical trial, luspatercept significantly reduced the need for frequent blood transfusions in just over half (53%) of patients with myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) who were anemic, required regular red blood cell transfusions, and showed abnormal iron overload in red...
For patients with difficult-to-treat chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), continuing to take ibrutinib (Imbruvica) before, during, and after receiving chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy may be associated with less severe adverse effects and better responses compared with outcomes for a...
A single infusion of tisagenlecleucel (Kymriah) in pediatric and young adult patients with relapsed or treatment-resistant acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL) continues to be highly effective in most patients, without the need for additional therapies. This latest analysis of the ELIANA trial results...
A new study presented by Woyach et al at the 2018 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition (Abstract 6) showed that older patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) have a significantly lower rate of disease progression if treated with ibrutinib rather than...
A new study suggests that it may be safet to reduce the standard course of treatment for younger patients with low-risk diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) by two cycles of chemotherapy. The trial, which tracked patients for a median of more than 5 years and up to 11 years, showed 4 cycles of...
A triplet therapy combining two immune checkpoint inhibitors with the standard of care azacitidine has shown promising results for treatment of relapsed or refractory acute myeloid leukemia (AML), according to the findings of a phase II study conducted at The University of Texas...
In an update to the global JULIET clinical trial, the chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy tisagenlecleucel (Kymriah) led to long-lasting remissions in patients with relapsed or refractory diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL). The most recent results from the trial were presented by...
The largest prospective trial of hydroxyurea for sickle cell anemia (SCA) has shown that this treatment—long the standard of care for treating SCA in developed countries—is feasible, accepted, well tolerated, and safe for children living in sub-Saharan Africa. Tshilolo et al reported...
Changes to the National Cancer Registration and Analysis Service (NCRAS) in England have allowed more accurate data analysis of primary and metastatic cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) since 2013. Developed by experts at Queen Mary University of London and Public Health England, and...
A population-based study examining patient receipt of a surveillance colonoscopy 3 years after the removal of high-risk adeonomatous polyps has found that the procedure was underutilized and varied by health-care system, patient age, and number of adenomas found. Strategies to improve adherence to...
In the phase III De-ESCALaTE trial reported in The Lancet, Mehanna et al found no difference in severe toxicity with cisplatin vs cetuximab (Erbitux) plus radiotherapy in low-risk human papillomavirus (HPV)-positive oropharyngeal cancer. Cetuximab was associated with poorer recurrence and survival...
YouTube videos on prostate cancer often offer misleading or biased medical information that poses potential health risks to patients, an analysis of the social media platform published by Loeb et al in European Urology showed. For the latest analysis, researchers, which included social...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently released new findings from the National Youth Tobacco Survey (NYTS) showing that more than 3.6 million middle and high school students were current (past 30 day) e-cigarette users in...
In a German phase II trial (RELAZA2) reported in The Lancet Oncology, Platzbecker et al found that minimal residual disease (MRD)–guided treatment with azacitidine was successful in preventing hematologic relapse in patients with myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) and acute myeloid leukemia...
Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved rituximab-abbs (Truxima) as the first biosimilar to rituximab (Rituxan) for the treatment of adult patients with CD20-positive, B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma to be used as a single agent or in combination with chemotherapy. Rituximab-abbs is ...
An antibody that binds simultaneously to two distinct regions of the HER2 receptor to block the growth of cancer cells has shown antitumor activity in a number of cancers, including those of the esophagus, stomach, and bowel. Updated results from a phase I clinical trial of the treatment, called...
New results from the long-running I-SPY 2 trial, which aimed to identify which new drugs or combinations of drugs are most effective in which types of breast cancer, demonstrated the usefulness of two genomic tests. Laura van ‘t Veer, PhD, leader of the Breast Oncology Program at the...
In a late-breaking presentation at the 30th EORTC-NCI-AACR Symposium on Molecular Targets and Cancer Therapeutics, Zev Wainberg, MD, reported on results from a phase II international clinical trial of dabrafenib (Tafinlar) plus trametinib (Mekinist), which showed some activity in 36 patients ...
In a study reported in JAMA Internal Medicine, Smith-Bindman et al found that the appearance of ovarian masses on ultrasonography was highly associated with risk of ovarian cancer in a large unselected population of women undergoing pelvic ultrasonography. Study Details The study was a nested...
In an international phase III trial (HR-NBL1/SIOPEN) reported in The Lancet Oncology, Ladenstein et al found that the addition of interleukin (IL)-2 to dinutuximab beta did not improve event-free survival in children and young people with high-risk neuroblastoma. Study Details The current report...
On November 21, 2018, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted accelerated approval to venetoclax (Venclexta) in combination with azacitidine or decitabine or low-dose cytarabine for the treatment of newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukemia (AML) in adults who are age 75 years or older or...
On November 26, 2018, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted accelerated approval to larotrectinib (Vitrakvi) for adult and pediatric patients with solid tumors that have a neurotrophic receptor tyrosine kinase (NTRK) gene fusion without a known acquired resistance mutation, whose...
ARTI HURRIA, MD, FASCO, died tragically on November 7, 2018, from injuries sustained in a traffic accident. Dr. Hurria was a national leader in geriatric oncology, embracing the age-associated nuances of the elderly, and leading initiatives and research that advanced this specialty field. “The...
Despite survival gains for children diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), adolescents and young adults (AYAs)— those between the ages of 15 and 39— diagnosed with the disease have seen only modest improvements in survival. A study by Julie A. Wolfson, MD, MSHS, Assistant Professor and ...
A therapeutic vaccine may boost antibodies and T cells, helping them infiltrate human papillomavirus (HPV)-related head and neck cancer tumors. Researchers from the Abramson Cancer Center of the University of Pennsylvania tested the immunotherapy in two groups of patients with advanced head and...