A draft recommendation from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) advises that for men aged 55 to 69, the decision to be screened for prostate cancer should be an individual one, based on the man’s own values and priorities and discussions with a clinician about the potential benefits...
For a man aged 55 to 69 years, the decision to be screened for prostate cancer should be an individual one, based on the man’s own values and priorities and discussions with a clinician about the potential benefits and harms of screening, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) advised in ...
In a Swedish study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Stacy Loeb, MD, of New York University, and colleagues found that use of testosterone replacement therapy was not associated with an increased risk of prostate cancer and was associated with a lower risk of aggressive cancer among...
The emerging field of molecular pathology focuses on the study and diagnosis of disease through the examination of genes and gene activity within organs and tissues. This information has transformed our thinking about the biologic diversity of breast cancers and has enhanced our treatment...
After undergoing nearly 5 years of intensive medical training, IBM’s Watson for Oncology cognitive computing system is starting to make good on its promise to accelerate personalized care for patients with cancer. The system has been trained by oncologists at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center ...
In both inpatient and outpatient medical settings, the physician-patient communication process can become more difficult as a disease progresses. Conflicts due to a misunderstanding of therapeutic goals and/or a patient’s values can slowly arise over time among patients, their surrogates, and...
Breast cancer surgeon Monica Morrow, MD, came from a town in the far northeast reaches of suburban Philadelphia. “I guess because there were only two girls in our family, I was the son my father never had, and he reared me that way. When we were playing catch, if I missed the ball and got hit in...
Three years ago, early results from the U.S. Intergroup C10403 trial,1 which evaluated the effectiveness of treating adolescent and young adults (AYAs) with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) using an intensive pediatric regimen, showed significant improvement in event-free and overall survival...
I recently saw a patient in our survivorship clinic. She was treated at age 15 years for Hodgkin lymphoma and is now in her early 50s. During the prior 2 decades, she had developed both bilateral breast cancer and thyroid cancer, as well as multiple basal cell carcinomas, all occurring within her...
In a retrospective multicenter cohort study reported in JAMA, Lucie M. Turcotte, MD, MPH, of the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, and colleagues found that the risk of subsequent neoplasms in 5-year survivors of childhood cancers decreased between those diagnosed in the 1970s vs the 1990s but ...
Three separate brief psychological interventions aimed at helping cancer patients cope with distress have shown improvements in quality of life and well-being across the continuum of cancer care. The interventions were studied—respectively—in newly diagnosed cancer patients, survivors after cancer...
Three-year follow-up data from the phase III RAY study in patients with relapsed or refractory mantle cell lymphoma were presented at the 14th International Conference on Malignant Lymphoma (ICML) in Lugano, Switzerland. These results demonstrated that the subset of patients treated with ibrutinib...
Data from the TRANSCEND trial of JCAR017 in relapsed and refractory aggressive B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) was presented at the 2017 International Conference on Malignant Lymphoma (ICML) in Lugano, Switzerland. JCAR017 is Juno Therapeutics’ investigative chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) ...
An interim analysis of MAGNIFY, a phase IIIb, randomized, open-label, multicenter study of the R2 combination regimen (lenalidomide [Revlimid] plus rituximab [Rituxan]) in patients with relapsed or refractory marginal zone lymphoma, was presented at the International Conference on Malignant...
An updated interim analysis from an ongoing phase I/II clinical trial evaluating brentuximab vedotin (Adcetris) and nivolumab (Opdivo) in relapsed or refractory classical Hodgkin lymphoma was presented at the International Conference on Malignant Lymphoma (ICML) in Lugano, Switzerland (Abstract...
Data was recently presented from the phase III GENUINE trial of ublituximab, a novel glycoengineered anti–CD20 monoclonal antibody, in combination with ibrutinib (Imbruvica), a Bruton tyrosine kinase (BTK) inhibitor, for the treatment of high-risk chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), at the...
Data from the chemotherapy-free triple combination of umbralisib, an oral, next generation PI3K delta inhibitor; ublituximab, a novel glycoengineered anti-CD20 monoclonal antibody; and ibrutinib (Imbruvica) in patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL)/small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL) and...
Positive interim efficacy data from an ongoing phase II clinical trial of tazemetostat, a first-in-class, oral enhancer of zeste homolog 2 (EZH2) inhibitor, as a single-agent treatment for relapsed or refractory patients with follicular lymphoma or diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) grouped by...
Simultaneous injections of the radiopharmaceuticals fluorine-18 fluorodeoxyglucose (F-18 FDG) and fluorine-18 sodium fluoride (F-18 NaF) followed by quantitative scanning significantly improved image quality and detection of bone metastases at a lower dose, according to research presented at...
According to a study by Olszewski and colleagues in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Medicare Part D beneficiaries without a low-income subsidy may face daunting barriers in affording oral immunomodulatory drugs for myeloma. The low-income subsidy markedly reduces out-of-pocket costs for...
Neuroendocrine tumors are difficult to manage and unlikely to be cured, but researchers intend to slow progression of these tumors and aid survival by personalizing patient doses of peptide receptor radionuclide therapy (PRRT), according to research presented at the 2017 Annual Meeting of the...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Shah et al, the phase IIIB HELOISE trial has shown no survival benefit of high-dose vs standard trastuzumab (Herceptin) maintenance plus chemotherapy in the first-line treatment of metastatic gastric or gastroesophageal junction adenocarcinoma....
A Dutch study has shown long-lasting risk for human papillomavirus (HPV)-related carcinoma and premalignancies in women with a diagnosis of cervical intraepithelial neoplasia grade 3 (CIN3). The findings were reported by Ebisch et al in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. Study Details The...
In the phase III BELLE-2 trial, the addition of the PI3K inhibitor buparlisib to fulvestrant (Faslodex) improved progression-free survival in postmenopausal hormone receptor–positive, HER2-negative advanced breast cancer—but at the cost of excessive toxicity. Results were reported in...
A study assessing the prevalence and distribution of programmed cell death ligand 2 (PD-L2) in human tumor samples across seven cancer indications, including renal cell carcinoma, bladder, melanoma, non–small cell lung cancer, triple-negative breast cancer, gastric carcinoma, and head and...
As reported by Le et al in Science, pembrolizumab (Keytruda) was found to be active across a range of solid tumors with mismatch-repair (MMR) deficiency. Pembrolizumab was recently approved for treatment of patients with unresectable or metastatic microsatellite instability–high (MSI-H) or...
In the phase III MONARCH 2 trial reported at the recent ASCO Annual Meeting and in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Sledge et al, the addition of the selective cyclin-dependent kinase 4 and 6 (CDK4/6) inhibitor abemaciclib to fulvestrant (Faslodex) improved progression-free survival in hormone...
For an investment of $125 for each year of life gained since the 1950s, the National Cancer Institute (NCI)-funded SWOG clinical trials program has added 3.34 million years of life for patients with cancer in the United States because of successful therapies that were proved through its trials....
As reported by Heist et al in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, the antibody-drug conjugate sacituzumab govitecan showed activity in patients with previously treated metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Sacituzumab targets Trop-2, present on many solid tumors; govitecan is the...
The phase III MSLT-II trial showed that completion dissection was not associated with improved melanoma-specific overall survival vs observation in patients with sentinel node metastasis, although a benefit was observed in regional disease control. The findings were reported in The New England...
On April 3, 2017, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) in New York celebrated its ninth year of live performances of the cancer experience written by survivors participating in the center’s Visible Ink writing program. The evening’s performances were the culmination of months-long...
Winship Cancer Institute of Emory University (Winship) is mourning the loss of an esteemed colleague: H. Jean Khoury, MD, died on May 22 at the age of 50, after a year spent battling cancer. His many colleagues and friends remember him as an outstanding physician, researcher, and educator and a...
Eight years ago, I was on top of the world. I had moved to Los Angeles, California, in 2007, from my home in Poços de Caldas, Brazil, to pursue my dream of launching a singing career in the United States, and was finally making progress. I had just completed composing songs for my debut album and...
BOOKMARK Title: What Patients Say, What Doctors HearAuthor: Danielle Ofri, MDPublisher: Beacon PressPublication date: February 2017Price: $24.95, hardcover, 288 pages Despite our scientific and medical advances, the single most important diagnostic tool is the doctor-patient conversation, which is ...
BOOKMARK Title: The Drug Hunters: The Improbable Quest to Discover New MedicinesAuthors: Donald R. Kirsch, PhD, and Ogi Ogas, PhDPublisher: Arcade PublishingPublication date: January 2017Price: $24.99, hardcover, 328 pages Only about 1 in 100 drug discovery projects initiated by the pharmaceutical ...
As reported by Joanne L. Blum, MD, PhD, of Baylor University Medical Center, Texas Oncology, and colleagues in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, the efficacy analysis of the combined adjuvant Anthracyclines in Early Breast Cancer (ABC) Trials showed better invasive disease-free survival with taxane ...
In the phase III CA184-095trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Tomasz M. Beer, MD, FACP, of the Knight Cancer Institute, Oregon Health and Science University, and colleagues found that ipilimumab (Yervoy) did not increase overall survival vs placebo in men with asymptomatic or...
The recent report of results of RTOG 9601 by Shipley et al in The New England Journal of Medicine1—reviewed in this issue of The ASCO Post—strongly supports the variably used practice of adding “androgen blockade” to salvage radiation therapy in men with a rising prostate-specific antigen (PSA)...
As reported in The New England Journal of Medicine by W.U. Shipley, MD, of Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, and colleagues in the NRG Oncology Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG), the final analysis of the phase III RTOG 9601 trial shows that the addition of...
The OAK study—recently reported by Rittmeyer and colleagues and reviewed in this issue of The ASCO Post—is the first study to show patients with previously treated non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) treated with a humanized antibody (atezolizumab, Tecentriq) directed against the programmed cell...
In the phase III OAK trial reported in The Lancet by Achim Rittmeyer, MD, of Lungenfachklinik Immenhausen, Germany, and colleagues, treatment with the anti–programmed cell death ligand 1 (PD-L1) antibody atezolizumab (Tecentriq) improved overall survival vs docetaxel in previously treated non–small ...
Over the past 20 years, the Intergroupe Francophone du Myelome (IFM) and Dr. Michel Attal have pioneered the use of autologous hematopoietic cell transplantation (AHCT) for multiple myeloma in a series of randomized studies. Notable studies include comparisons of planned upfront AHCT vs...
In the French phase III IFM 2009 trial reported in The New England Journal of Medicine by Michel Attal, MD, of the Institut Universitaire du Cancer de Toulouse-Oncopole, and colleagues, consolidation treatment with lenalidomide (Revlimid), bortezomib (Velcade), and dexamethasone (RVD) was...
This year, the World Health Organization (WHO) will launch a pilot project for prequalifying biosimilar medicines, a step toward making some of the most expensive treatments for cancer more widely available in low- and middle-income countries. The decision comes after a 2-day meeting in Geneva...
Brian Marr, MD, has joined the Department of Ophthalmology at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia University Medical Center as Director of the Division of Ophthalmic Oncology. He will also serve as Professor of Ophthalmology at Columbia University Medical Center. With Dr. Marr’s arrival,...
Brian Wolpin, MD, MPH, has been named the new Director of the Gastrointestinal Cancer Center at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Dr. Wolpin is Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and was appointed earlier this year as the Robert T. and Judith B. Hale Chair in Pancreatic Cancer...
Nearly 2,500 children in the United States are diagnosed with brain tumors each year, making these malignancies among the most common solid tumors in children and adolescents. Despite advances over the past few decades, the treatment of brain tumors remains one of the most challenging clinical...
Geriatrics for the Oncologist is guest edited by Stuart M. Lichtman, MD, FACP, FASCO, and developed in collaboration with the International Society of Geriatric Oncology (SIOG). Dr. Lichtman is an Attending Physician at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Commack, New York, and Professor of...
ASCO is very fortunate to have an active member base eager to volunteer, share expertise, and give back to the oncology community. Currently, more than 2,000 volunteers are engaged on ASCO committees, subcommittees, working groups, panels, task forces, editorial boards, and in various training...
ASCO is making it easier for practices to understand and prepare for the transition to the Quality Payment Program (QPP) in the years ahead with its ASCO COME HOME initiative. ASCO COME HOME provides readiness assessment tools to help practices evaluate whether or not they are ready to transition...