Colonoscopies performed with computer-aided detection, or artificial intelligence (AI), saw an increase in the overall rate of detection of adenoma, or cancerous and precancerous polyps, by 27% in average-risk patients, according to new data presented by Shaukat et al at Digestive Disease Week 2022 ...
On a cool, gray November morning, I took the call from a walk-in doctor about Carla, a 26-year-old woman with progressive lymphadenopathy who was refusing investigations because of severe needle phobia. Carla was willing to meet with me to discuss treatment options for a suspected diagnosis of...
"The reality is that closure is a myth. My personal and professional experience with those who have lost friends and family, including children, has taught me that going on with life is not the same as gaining closure. The wound of loss is a part of each person’s life forever,” wrote...
On May 27, 2022, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the following for the first-line treatment of patients with advanced or metastatic esophageal squamous cell carcinoma: Nivolumab (Opdivo) in combination with fluoropyrimidine- and platinum-based chemotherapy Nivolumab in...
On May 28, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted accelerated approval to the chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy tisagenlecleucel (Kymriah) for the treatment of adult patients with relapsed or refractory follicular lymphoma after two or more lines of systemic therapy....
The availability of numerous new agents for treating multiple myeloma has created some “conundrums” for clinicians, said Sergio Giralt, MD, Deputy Head of the Division of Hematologic Malignancies at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and the Melvin Berlin Family Chair in Myeloma Research and...
On May 25, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved ivosidenib (Tibsovo) in combination with azacitidine for patients with newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukemia (AML) with a susceptible IDH1 mutation as detected by an FDA-approved test in adults aged 75 or older, or who have...
A rapid update to the ASCO Guideline on neoadjuvant therapy for breast cancer adds a recommendation on the use of pembrolizumab in patients with high-risk early-stage triple-negative breast cancer.1 The update follows a recent analysis from the randomized phase III KEYNOTE-522 trial that showed a...
The combination of neoadjuvant nivolumab plus chemotherapy achieved statistically significant and clinically meaningful improvement in event-free survival vs chemotherapy alone (P = .005) in patients with resectable non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC, stage IB–IIIA), according to the results of the ...
Esophageal cancer is associated with significant morbidity and mortality worldwide, with more than 600,000 new cases and 540,000 deaths in 2020. The squamous cell histology comprises nearly 90% of cases globally, despite its steady decline in the United States over the past 40 years. Historically,...
Invited discussant of the NeoCOAST trial, Edward B. Garon, MD, Professor of Medicine and Director of the Thoracic Oncology Program at David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California Los Angeles, praised the study: “NeoCOAST is an impressive study that showed numerical benefit when...
Use of multiple immune pathway inhibitors appears to be superior to checkpoint inhibitor therapy alone as neoadjuvant therapy for resectable non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), according to the results of the phase II NeoCOAST trial presented at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR)...
Radiation segmentectomy may be an effective treatment for very early– to early-stage hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) that cannot be treated surgically or thermally. The findings from a multidisciplinary study by researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai were published by Kim et al...
A sizable proportion of patients with advanced melanoma will experience disease progression on anti–PD-1 therapy, and the optimal treatment of such patients represents an unmet need. Two studies presented at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Annual Meeting 2022 explored separate...
The advent of PD-1 and PD-L1 checkpoint inhibitors has changed the treatment landscape of advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), but only approximately 20% of patients treated with immunotherapy will be alive at 5 years. According to Melissa L. Johnson, MD, Director, Lung Cancer Research,...
The human epidermal growth factor (HER) family of receptors are a well-established therapeutic target. Indeed, seminal studies conducted nearly 2 decades ago identified a key association between activating mutations in the kinase domain of the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR, also known as...
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK) recently announced the establishment of The Starr Foundation Program for Discovery Science, a pioneering initiative made possible by a $50 million gift from The Starr Foundation. The program will support the work of scientists at the Sloan Kettering...
Ongoing evaluation of novel, targeted, and immunotherapies has led to exciting advances across the array of hematologic malignancies over the past year. The availability of new treatment options, along with emerging data on novel combinations and sequencing approaches, is rapidly changing...
For the first-line treatment of newly diagnosed multiple myeloma, the percentage of patients achieving measurable residual disease (MRD, previously called minimal residual disease) negativity was significantly greater when the anti-CD38 monoclonal antibody isatuximab was added to a standard...
The autologous chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy tisagenlecleucel failed to improve event-free survival vs standard-of-care treatment strategies in patients with aggressive, relapsed or refractory non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL), according to results of the phase III BELINDA trial,...
Press conference moderator, Laurie H. Sehn, MD, MPH, of the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, noted, that her center participated in the single-arm trial of mosunetuzumab. “We witnessed first-hand the tremendous capacity bispecific antibodies have to make a real difference in...
The bispecific antibody mosunetuzumab achieved deep and durable remissions as monotherapy in patients with relapsed or refractory follicular lymphoma, according to the results of a pivotal phase II trial presented at the 2021 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition.1 In ...
As a first-line treatment of inter-mediate- or high-risk diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, the addition of the antibody-drug conjugate polatuzumab vedotin-piiq to standard-of-care therapy resulted in a 27% reduction in the relative risk of disease progression, relapse, or death, with a similar safety...
In the primary analysis of the phase III ZUMA-7 trial, examining second-line therapy for relapsed or refractory large B-cell lymphoma, the CAR T-cell therapy axicabtagene ciloleucel led to a fourfold increase in event-free survival over the standard of care. These findings were presented at the...
Administering time-limitedcombination regimens of venetoclax plus obinutuzumab or venetoclax plus obinutuzumab and ibrutinib was superior to chemoimmunotherapy in achieving undetectable measurable residual disease (MRD) in the peripheral blood at month 15 in fit patients with chronic lymphocytic...
Two different trials presented at the 2021 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition found that fixed-duration treatment with ibrutinib and venetoclax achieved deep and sustained undetectable measurable residual disease (MRD) status when used as first-line therapy for...
Zanubrutinib, a second-generation Bruton’s tyrosine kinase (BTK) inhibitor, significantly improved response rates and delayed disease progression as compared with the standard of care, ibrutinib, in patients with relapsed or refractory chronic lymphocytic leukemia or small lymphocytic lymphoma...
Acalabrutinib was equally efficacious with less toxicity when compared directly with ibrutinib in patients with previously treated relapsed or refractory chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), according to the results of an open-label, randomized, noninferiority phase III trial presented at the 2021...
When compared with intravenous (IV) chemotherapy, the use of intraperitoneal (IP) carboplatin with dose-dense weekly paclitaxel improved progression-free survival in patients with ovarian, fallopian tube, or primary peritoneal carcinoma, according to data presented at the 2022 Society of...
On May 4, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved fam-trastuzumab deruxtecan-nxki (Enhertu) for pretreated adult patients with unresectable or metastatic HER2-positive breast cancer. According to the approval, patients had to have received a prior anti-HER2–based regimen either in the...
The novel antibody-drug conjugate mirvetuximab soravtansine could become the new standard of care for patients with folate receptor alpha–positive, platinum-resistant ovarian cancer, according to data presented at the Society of Gynecologic Oncology (SGO) 2022 Annual Meeting on Women’s Cancer.1...
In the article “OlympiA Trial: Adjuvant Olaparib Significantly Improves Overall Survival in Germline BRCA-Mutated Breast Cancer,” which began on page 1 of the April 10 issue of The ASCO Post, a few unfortunate errors appeared, notably an incorrect P value for the overall survival comparison (after...
Amandeep Salhotra, MD, Associate Professor of Leukemia at City of Hope, in California, said this study should form the basis for a prospective phase III study in which older patients with AML (60–75 years) should have equal chance at randomization to either arm to remove bias on the part of...
The “holy grail” of triple-negative breast cancer therapy has been effective incorporation of drugs to improve outcomes in the early nonmetastatic setting. Although outcomes have improved with better chemotherapy drugs and schedules, triple-negative breast cancer still carries the worst prognosis...
Editor’s Note: The following is adapted from Dr. Hrynkiv’s presentation at the March 18 ASCO/ECO Briefing: Cancer Care During the War in Ukraine. Find resources for impacted patients and providers at asco.org/ukraine and onco-help.org. Official statistics regarding damage and losses in Ukraine are...
Taking aspirin daily does not prevent breast cancer recurrence, according to research presented during the February ASCO Plenary Series Program.1 Results of the double-blind phase III study of more than 3,000 patients with high-risk, HER2-negative breast cancer showed no improvement in invasive...
Adjuvant pembrolizumab improves disease-free survival compared with placebo in patients with early-stage non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) following complete resection and adjuvant chemotherapy when indicated. These findings from the PEARLS/KEYNOTE-091 trial were reported in a European Society for ...
In the treatment of advanced endometrial cancer, maintenance therapy with oral selinexor after response to first-line chemotherapy may result in a significantly reduced risk of disease progression, according to the results of the global phase III ENGOT-EN5/GOG-3055/SIENDO trial, presented at the...
Charu Aggarwal, MD, MPH, discussant of the CHOICE-01 trial, underscored the “tremendous progress” that’s been made over the past 2 decades in the management of metastatic non–small cell lung cancer, with overall survival increasing from less than 1 year with the use of combination chemotherapy to...
Adding the PD-1 inhibitor toripalimab to chemotherapy significantly improved survival compared with chemotherapy alone in patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) without EGFR/ALK mutations, according to research presented during the 2022 ASCO Monthly Plenary Series.1 At the...
Imagine this. You are a large pharmaceutical company that launches an international randomized phase III trial to assess whether one of your drugs improves the outcome of patients with a common type of cancer. The trial was solidly backed by preclinical evidence that the drug target was essential ...
A novel immunotherapeutic combination that targets PD-1 and the LAG-3 pathway significantly delayed disease progression as a first-line treatment of advanced or unresectable melanoma. Updated results of the global phase III RELATIVITY-047 trial validated the study’s initial findings and were...
The addition of the checkpoint inhibitor tislelizumab to first-line chemotherapy significantly reduced the risk of disease progression or death by 50% and, despite a 49% crossover rate, numerically boosted overall survival in patients with recurrent or metastatic nasopharyngeal cancer, Zhang et al...
Results from two early-stage clinical trials show two drugs that target the DNA damage response (DDR) pathway in cancers—the ATR inhibitor elimusertib and the PARP inhibitor AZD5305—are safe and clinically beneficial in treating patients with advanced solid tumors. Principal investigator Timothy...
In a phase II trial (arm E of the NCI-COG Pediatric MATCH trial) reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Eckstein et al found that the MEK inhibitor selumetinib showed little activity in pediatric and young adult patients with tumors harboring activating MAPK pathway mutations or fusions. As...
Patients with advanced melanoma whose cancer does not respond to treatment with PD-1 inhibitors are often switched to treatment with a second type of immunotherapy drug, a CTLA-4 inhibitor such as the drug ipilimumab. In a phase II trial presented by Vanderwalde et al during the American...
Combination immunotherapy with the anti–PD-L1 monoclonal antibody durvalumab and other novel agents outperforms durvalumab alone in the neoadjuvant setting for early-stage non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), according to research presented by Cascone et al at the American Association for Cancer...
Over the past decade, an improved understanding of kidney cancer biology together with the development of novel systemic therapies have substantially improved the outcomes of patients with metastatic clear cell renal cell carcinoma (RCC).1 Following extensive clinical investigations, combinations...
The OlympiA trial of adjuvant olaparib in patients with HER2-negative, high-risk early-stage breast cancer and BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutations has now demonstrated a significant overall survival benefit, reducing the risk of death over placebo by 32% and yielding an absolute improvement of 3.8% at 3...
Nothing can really prepare you for cancer, but it helped that I have dedicated my life in service to others as a minister and advocate for social justice and health equity in breast cancer survivorship. Before my own breast cancer diagnosis in 2016, I had spent years as a volunteer for several...