The GO2 Foundation for Lung Cancer presented Charles Swanton, MD, PhD, FRCP, FMedSci, FRS, Senior Group Leader at the Francis Crick Institute, with the 2020 Bonnie J. Addario Lectureship Award at the Physicians’ Education Resource 21st Annual International Lung Cancer Congress. GO2 is recognizing...
Mary-Claire King, PhD, will receive the William L. McGuire Memorial Lecture Award at the 2020 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium (SABCS), to be held virtually from December 8 to 12, 2020. The William L. McGuire Memorial Lectureship was established in 1992 to commemorate Dr. McGuire’s significant...
The Association of Community Cancer Centers (ACCC) announced the winning programs for its 10th annual ACCC Innovator Awards, highlighting the year’s leading-edge strategies to challenges faced by oncology programs and practices across the country. The eight ACCC Innovator Award winners feature...
For nearly 30 years, from the time he was a young resident at the Collis P. Huntington Memorial Hospital for Cancer Research of Harvard University, until his death from lung cancer on August 31, 1969, David A. Karnofsky, MD, dedicated himself to the pursuit of scientific excellence and the...
The dramatic advances in the diagnosis and treatment of multiple myeloma over the past 20 years have resulted in significant improvements in overall survival, with 5-year relative survival rates now around 50% and more than 60% for patients younger than age 70.1 The proteasome inhibitors...
Three years ago, former Chief Executive Officer of ASCO, Allen S. Lichter, MD, Laurence H. Baker, DO, Professor in the Departments of Internal Medicine and Pharmacology at the University of Michigan Medical School in Ann Arbor; Leonard Saltz, MD, a gastrointestinal oncologist at Memorial Sloan...
The ASCO Answers Guide to Survivorship has the tools and resources your patients need to prepare for their lives after treatment. This vital resource will inform your patients and their caregivers about topics like the importance of follow-up care, concerns about recurrence, and managing long-term...
JCO Oncology Practice has published an article on rural cancer care as part of the State of Cancer Care in America series. “Closing the Rural Cancer Care Gap: Three Institutional Approaches” draws from data presented during the second State of Cancer Care in America live event as well as supporting ...
Brazilian jiu-jitsu (BJJ) athletes use combat techniques designed to dominate one’s opponent with control and force. The goal: make your opponent be the first to tap out. In 2010, BJJ practitioner Jon Thomas was surprised to discover there was no philanthropic presence within his sport. That’s when ...
The Association for Clinical Oncology signed on to a letter from the American Medical Association (AMA) and statements from the Council of Medical Specialty Societies and the American College of Physicians’ Council of Subspecialty Societies expressing concerns about the Trump Administration’s...
Uriya, age 49, visits Israel’s Rabin Medical Center for a cancer screening. On the surface, he shows no signs of disease. However, results from a study by David Margel, MD, PhD, revealed Uriya is living with prostate cancer at an early yet curable stage. Uriya carries the BRCA gene. Rabin Medical...
Cancer does not affect all people equally. The phrase “cancer disparities” refers to the differences in the number of new cancer cases as well as differences in cancer outcomes that exist among different populations. Disparities more often negatively affect racial and ethnic minorities, poor...
The Bruton’s tyrosine kinase (BTK) inhibitors have been one of the most exciting advances in the tre atment of chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) and have led to the development of chemotherapy-free treatments for both treatment-naive as well as relapsed or refractory CLL based on studies where...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Paolo Ghia, MD, PhD, of the Università Vita-Salute San Raffaele, Milan, Italy, and colleagues, the phase III ASCEND trial showed significantly prolonged progression-free survival with acalabrutinib monotherapy vs the investigator’s choice of...
Cleveland Clinic has appointed Jae Jung, PhD, as Chair of Lerner Research Institute’s Department of Cancer Biology. Dr. Jung will also serve as Director of the new Center for Global and Emerging Pathogens Research, which will focus on public health threats ranging from the Zika virus to...
As investigators, we were always determined to find the drug to work with BRAF/MEK inhibitor combination therapy. It had come on like a storm and showed us that we could help even those with the most advanced metastatic melanoma, as long as it harbored the magical BRAF V600E mutation.1...
As reported inThe Lancet by Ralf Gutzmer, MD, of Medizinische Hochschule Hannover, Germany, and colleagues, the phase III IMspire150 trial has shown that the addition of atezolizumab to BRAF and MEK inhibitor therapy with vemurafenib and cobimetinib improved progression-free survival in the...
The Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy (PICI) announced that John Connolly, PhD, has been named Chief Scientific Officer. In this role, Dr. Connolly will design and execute PICI’s overall research strategy in close collaboration with the institute’s leadership team, center directors, and...
A consensus statement published in JAMA Dermatology by an international group of melanoma researchers evaluated the use of prognostic gene-expression profile testing to guide clinical management of melanoma.1 The group cautioned against the routine use of currently available gene-expression...
The ASCO Post is pleased to present Hematology Expert Review, an ongoing feature that occasionally quizzes readers on issues in hematology. In this installment, Drs. Abutalib, Pemmaraju, and Medeiros highlight the clinically aggressive blastic plasmacytoid dendritic cell neoplasm. For each quiz...
The University of Southern California (USC) Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center and Keck Medicine of USC have announced the appointment of oncologist and cancer researcher Steven Grossman, MD, PhD, as the center’s Cancer Physician in Chief. In this inaugural position, Dr. Grossman will provide...
The Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) President David J. Cole, MD, FACS, has announced the appointment of MUSC College of Medicine Dean Raymond N. DuBois, MD, PhD, to the additional role as Director of the MUSC Hollings Cancer Center. Dr. DuBois has headed the College of Medicine for more ...
St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital has appointed Heather Brandt, PhD, a behavioral scientist with expertise in cancer prevention and control, to lead community outreach and research programs focused on the prevention of human papillomavirus (HPV)-associated cancers through vaccination. In...
William G. Kaelin, Jr, MD, will receive a Distinguished Scientist Award from the Association of American Cancer Institutes (AACI) on October 12, during the 2020 AACI/Cancer Center Administrators Forum Annual Meeting. Due to COVID-19–related restrictions on travel and gatherings, the meeting will...
Following an extensive national search, Bert W. O’Malley, Jr, MD, has been appointed as the new President and Chief Executive Officer of the University of Maryland Medical Center (UMMC), the flagship academic hospital for the University of Maryland Medical System and an anchor institution in...
In the Clinic provides overviews of novel oncology agents, addressing indications, mechanisms of action, administration recommendations, safety profiles, and other essential information needed for the appropriate clinical use of these drugs. On July 31, 2020, tafasitamab-cxix, a CD19-directed...
A vaccine for COVID-19 is currently the Holy Grail, but even if an effective vaccine were developed on a fast-track timetable, it may be effective in only a percentage of people, judging by existing flu vaccines, which show efficacy rates of approximately 45% and vary year by year. Until we have a...
In May 2020, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved ripretinib for patients who have received prior treatment with three or more kinase inhibitors, including imatinib, for advanced gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST). The approval was largely based on the findings of the...
As reported inThe Lancet Oncology by Jean-Yves Blay, MD, of Centre Léon Bérard, Lyon, France, and colleagues, the phase III INVICTUS trial has shown that the oral KIT and PDGFRα tyrosine kinase inhibitor ripretinib significantly prolonged progression-free survival vs placebo in patients with...
Oncologists should consider screening all patients with cancer for the hepatitis B virus (HBV) prior to starting systemic anticancer therapy, with a focus on tests that use the hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg), hepatitis B core antibody (anti-HBc), total Ig or IgG, and antihepatitis B surface...
At the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) World Congress on Gastrointestinal Cancer 2020 Virtual, Milind Javle, MD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, and colleagues reported that third- and later-line treatment with the selective fibroblast growth factor...
In the time of COVID-19, there is much to learn about the intersection of coronavirus and cancer. One area of concern has been whether immunotherapies increase the risk of mortality in patients with cancer who also have COVID-19 infection. “To what extent immune checkpoint inhibition affects...
Three years ago, ASCO updated its clinical practice guideline on the integration of palliative care into standard oncology care for patients with advanced cancer. The update was based on multiple randomized clinical trials showing better results with concurrent care than with usual oncology care...
Palliative care services are so crucial to the well-being of patients with cancer that, in 2017, ASCO updated its clinical practice guideline on the integration of palliative care into standard oncology care.1 The updated guideline recommends that all patients with advanced cancer receive dedicated ...
As chemotherapy and chemoimmunotherapy regimens reach their maximal impact in follicular lymphoma and mantle cell lymphoma, clinicians are turning to chemotherapy-free approaches to achieve better control, less toxicity, and (hopefully) a cure. During the ASCO20 Virtual Education Program, Sonali M. ...
My husband and I adopted our cat, Franklin, on a cold November day. It was one of the last days Andrew felt well enough to leave the house to go anywhere other than to chemotherapy or a doctor’s appointment. Our news at these appointments had shifted toward the negative, with disease progression...
As evidenced at this year’s ASCO20 Virtual Scientific Program, oncology science, technology, and clinical practice are evolving at a rapid pace, bringing new challenges to the efficient and ethical practice of cancer care at all levels. To shed light on some of the large-scale public health and...
A trend of higher lung cancer incidence rates in young Black people vs young White people in the United States has flipped, with the Black-White gap disappearing in men and reversing in women. The changing trends coincide with steeper declines in smoking among Black Americans, according to a new...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Abida and colleagues, the phase II TRITON2 trial has shown that rucaparib produces durable responses in patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer with deleterious BRCA1 or BRCA2 alterations. The trial supported the May 2020...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Duffy et al, final results of the UK Age Trial show that initiation of annual mammography screening for breast cancer at age 40 was associated with a significant reduction in breast cancer mortality at 10 years compared with screening beginning at age 50 years, ...
This week on The ASCO Post Podcast, we'll first hear about a study that found a steep decline in non–small cell lung cancer mortality from 2013 to 2016. Then, we'll close out with a review of a report on the addition of locoregional radiotherapy to chemotherapy in patients with...
On August 20, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved daratumumab (Darzalex) in combination with carfilzomib (Kyprolis) and dexamethasone (DKd) for the treatment of adult patients with relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma who have received one to three previous lines of therapy....
ASCO has released an update to its Metastatic Pancreatic Cancer Guideline that includes recommendations for second-line treatment, including early biomarker testing for actionable genomic alterations.1 Last updated in 2018, this new version was triggered by novel evidence related to targeted...
Recently, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted Priority Reviews for a novel dosing regimen for durvalumab as well as for trilaciclib in small cell lung cancer; granted Fast Track designations to treatments for glioblastoma and B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia; and issued reports...
In a Chinese phase III trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Xuan et al found that sorafenib maintenance after allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation significantly reduced the risk of relapse vs no maintenance therapy in patients with FLT3–internal tandem duplication (ITD)–positive...
In a retrospective cohort study reported in JAMA Surgery, Xiao et al found that low skeletal muscle index and low skeletal muscle radiodensity were associated with an increased risk of complications and poor outcomes following surgery for colon cancer. Study Details The study involved data on...
Researchers have found that greater gut microbial diversity in patients with metastatic kidney cancer is associated with better treatment outcomes in those receiving immunotherapy. These findings were published by Salgia et al in European Urology. “We also reported the changes over time in the gut...
The results of an online questionnaire of 609 breast cancer survivors in the United States suggest that nearly half of patients experienced delays in care during the early weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic. The study was published by Papautsky et al in the journal Breast Cancer Research and ...
“The distressing intersection of COVID-19 and cancer requires the use of large registries to acknowledge diversity,” stated Solange Peters, MD, PhD, President of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO), in her keynote speech at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Virtual...
In a systematic review and meta-analysis reported in JAMA Network Open, Yang et al found overall survival benefits with immune checkpoint inhibitor treatment vs non–immune checkpoint inhibitor treatment of advanced cancers irrespective of sex, age < 65 years vs ≥ 65 years, or Eastern Cooperative ...