Waun Ki Hong, MD, FACP, FASCO, led numerous clinical trials showing that cisplatin-based chemotherapy and radiotherapy could effectively treat patients with cancer of the larynx while sparing their voice box. This seminal work also served as a model for organ-preservation strategies in many other...
The International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (IASCL) announced the death of Adi Gazdar, MD, of The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, on December 29, 2018. Dr. Gazdar, a leader in lung cancer pathology, was a cell line pioneer and a groundbreaking pathologist....
An emerging treatment known as adoptive T-cell therapy has proven effective in a phase II clinical trial for treating progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML), a rare and often fatal brain infection sometimes observed in patients with cancer and other diseases in which the immune system is...
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has bestowed upon 416 of its members the lifetime honor of being an elected Fellow in recognition of their achievements in advancing science, some of whom are involved in oncology. The Fellows will be recognized at the 2019 AAAS Annual...
Ever since President Barack Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) into law on March 23, 2010, the nondiscrimination provision of the law, Section 1557, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, age, or disability in certain health ...
ASCO has elected Lori J. Pierce, MD, FASTRO, FASCO, a long-time member and volunteer, to serve as its President for the term beginning in June 2020. She will take office as President-Elect during the ASCO Annual Meeting in Chicago in June 2019. Six new members were also elected to the ASCO Board of ...
In a study reported in JAMA Oncology, Islami et al assessed the population attributable fraction (PAF)—the proportion of a given outcome attributable to a given risk factor—of incident cancer cases associated with excess body weight among individual U.S. states during 2011 to 2015. The...
Researchers have identified a new potential immunotherapy target in pancreatic cancer, which so far has been notoriously resistant to treatment with immune checkpoint blockade drugs effective against a variety of other cancers. A research team from The University of Texas MD Anderson ...
In a single-center experience reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Amit et al found that among patients with sinonasal undifferentiated carcinoma with a favorable response to induction chemotherapy, disease-specific survival was better in those receiving definitive concurrent...
A study investigating how to identify and treat patients with high- and low-risk human papillomavirus (HPV)-related oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma has demonstrated variations in HPV-related molecules among HPV-positive cases of the disease. Using their findings, the investigators developed a ...
ASCO AND THE ONCOLOGY COMMUNITY mourn the loss of ASCO Past President and former SWOG leader Charles A. Coltman, Jr, MD, FASCO, President Emeritus, Cancer Therapy & Research Center, The University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. Dr. Coltman died on November 28 at the age of 88....
In a single-center phase II study reported in JAMA Oncology, Erminia Massarelli, MD, and colleagues found combining tumor-specific vaccine and nivolumab (Opdivo) showed evidence of activity in incurable human papillomavirus (HPV) 16–related cancer. The therapeutic vaccine, ISA 101, induces...
As the field of immunotherapy accelerates, so does the literature reporting on the path ahead. One of the newer books on the topic is A Cure Within: Scientists Unleashing the Immune System to Kill Cancer. It has a top-notch pedigree: the author, Neil Canavan, is a seasoned journalist with more than ...
MINIMALLY INVASIVE radical hysterectomy for women with early-stage cervical cancer has been associated with reduced rates of disease-free and overall survival in the phase III LACC randomized noninferiority trial comparing minimally invasive and open abdominal radical hysterectomy. The results...
FOUR AND A HALF YEARS AGO, author Neil Canavan attended a scientific conference to learn what he could about the then-emerging field of immunotherapy for cancer. After a presentation by Zelig Eshhar, PhD, principal investigator in the Department of Immunology at the Weizmann Institute of Science...
The European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) 2018 Congress featured an assortment of study findings, many with far-reaching clinical implications for the treatment of patients with various cancers. Many of these trials were covered in-depth in recent issues of The ASCO Post. Here, we present...
TWO STUDIES recently reported in The New England Journal of Medicine indicate that minimally invasive radical hysterectomy is associated with poorer survival outcomes than open abdominal radical hysterectomy in women with early-stage cervical cancer. As reported by Pedro T. Ramirez, MD, of The...
MORE THAN $4.5 million in new funding from state and federal agencies will support cancer-related research over the next 5 years at The University of Texas at Dallas. Two projects related to brain cancer, each totaling $200,000 over 2 years, recently received High-Impact/High-Risk Research...
High drug prices are the number one health-care concern of many Americans. The average price of a cancer drug rose from less than $10,000/yr before 2000 to more than $170,000/yr in 2017.1-3 Between 1995 and 2013, the launch price of cancer drugs increased by 10% to 12% every year, and the average...
In a noninferiority phase III trial (NRG Oncology RTOG 1016) reported in The Lancet, Gillison et al found that radiotherapy plus cetuximab (Erbitux) was associated with poorer overall survival vs radiotherapy plus cisplatin in patients with human papillomavirus (HPV)-positive oropharyngeal...
ASCO’s Conquer Cancer Foundation is committed to supporting the research and career development of young researchers through its Grants & Awards Program. On October 10–11, 2018, Conquer Cancer hosted its 4th Scientific and Career Development Retreat at ASCO headquarters in Alexandria,...
IN PATIENTS with a controlled primary tumor and up to 5 oligometastatic lesions, delivering stereotactic ablative radiotherapy was associated with a 13-month improvement in overall survival when compared with palliative standard-of-care treatments alone (41 months vs 28 months; P = .09).1...
FOR A SUBSET of patients with stage IV lung cancer, aggressive treatment may improve overall survival, according to data presented at the 2018 Annual Meeting of the American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO).1 The results of the phase II study showed that with long-term follow-up, local...
AT THE 2018 Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC) Annual Meeting, Aung Naing, MD, FACP, of the Department of Investigational Cancer Therapeutics at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, commented on studies evaluating novel drugs to be combined with programmed cell death ...
THE 2018 Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC) Annual Meeting hosted a meeting of the minds of the world’s premier cancer immunologists. In addition to the cutting-edge laboratory science explored and presented at the meeting, numerous phase I clinical trials and a few phase II studies offered ...
THE STUDY’S discussant, Susan M. O’Brien, MD, Associate Director for Clinical Science, Chao Family Comprehensive Cancer Center, University of California Irvine Health, said the results of the Alliance North American Intergroup Study A041202—demonstrating that ibrutinib (Imbruvica) is more...
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...
Julie Vose, MD, MBA, of the University of Nebraska Medical Center, and Loretta J. Nastoupil, MD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discuss findings from a multicenter study of axicabtagene ciloleucel CD19 CAR T-cell therapy for relapsed or refractory aggressive B-cell lymphoma...
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...
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 a phase III trial (Laparoscopic Approach to Cervical Cancer [LACC]) reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Ramirez et al found that minimally invasive radical hysterectomy was associated with poorer disease-free and overall survival vs open abdominal radical hysterectomy in women with...
The ASCO Nominating Committee has selected 15 distinguished ASCO members as candidates for open leadership positions within the Society, including: The office of President-Elect Three seats on the Society’s Board of Directors Three seats on the Nominating Committee Biographical information and...
In response to the opioid-overdose epidemic, several measures have been put in place, such as the reclassification of hydrocodone as a Schedule II opioid and new requirements for physician review of prescription drug–monitoring program databases in most states. Moreover, the Surgeon General and...
A combination of the chemotherapy drug azacitidine with the immune checkpoint inhibitor nivolumab (Opdivo) demonstrated an encouraging response rate and overall survival in patients with relapsed or refractory acute myeloid leukemia (AML), according to findings from a phase II study published...
Steven A. Rosenberg, MD, PhD, knew from the start of his medical career that if treatments for cancer were to become curative, research in new therapies would have to move away from the mainstay one-size-fits-all approach of systemic chemotherapy to an innovative, personalized strategy that...
Randomized clinical trials have been providing high-quality evidence for decades, but there are limitations to the traditional design. At the 2018 ASCO Quality Care Symposium, George J. Chang, MD, MS, FACS, FASCRS, discussed the need to modernize clinical trials, so they continue to provide...
The combination of radium-223 plus AAP (abiraterone acetate [Zytiga] and prednisone) was not superior to placebo plus AAP in the phase III ERA 223 trial, which enrolled men with asymptomatic bone-predominant metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer.1 Patients treated with the combination had ...
ME STRONG, a nonprofit public charity in Deland, Florida, is one of the newest supporters of Conquer Cancer. Linda Ryan, ME STRONG co-founder and 16-year cancer survivor, understands the importance of research: it saved her life decades ago, and she’s relying on experimental treatment as she...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Shaitelman et al, 3-year outcomes of a phase III noninferiority trial indicate that hypofractionated whole-breast irradiation (HF-WBI) followed by a tumor bed boost is not inferior to conventionally fractionated whole-breast irradiation (CF-WBI)...
In December, The University of Texas at Austin Dell Medical School will launch an innovative cancer care model called the CaLM (cancer life re-imagined) Clinic as part of its new cancer center, the Livestrong Cancer Institutes. The goal of the Livestrong Cancer Institutes and the CaLM Clinic is to...
AS AN INTERNIST, I strived to give patients hope by prescribing therapies that increased their chance—their hope—of the best outcome and by encouraging them with hopeful words. My own hope was to care for patients until I was old. Just weeks after celebrating my 36th birthday, I was diagnosed with ...
BOOKMARK Title: Here We Grow: Mindfulness Through Cancer and BeyondAuthor: Paige DavisPublisher: She Writes PressDate: May 2018Price: $22.95, paperback, 154 pages Since the publication of Dr. Paul Kalanithi’s best-selling book, When Breath Becomes Air, about his diagnosis of cancer and untimely...
Adding radiation therapy or surgery to systemic therapy for patients with stage IV lung cancer whose cancer has spread to a limited number of sites can significantly extend overall survival, according to new results from a multicenter, randomized, controlled phase II study. The findings were...
Daniel R. Gomez, MD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses the final results of a phase II study on local consolidative therapy, which improved overall survival compared with maintenance therapy and observation in oligometastatic non–small cell lung cancer (Abstract LBA3).
The Gastric Cancer Foundation launched its new website this month and introduced an online clinical trials navigator to help patients more easily identify clinical trials matched with their specific diagnosis, stage, and treatment history. A special grant from Stupid Strong Charitable Foundation, a ...
Nationally regarded breast cancer researcher and clinician Joyce A. O’Shaughnessy, MD, was born in upstate New York, just outside of Albany, where she attended grade school before her family moved to Beverly, Massachusetts, a suburban town 26 miles from Boston, where her family’s roots were....
Three new Vice-Chairs of the Scientific Advisory Committee of Stand Up To Cancer (SU2C) were announced by the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), the Scientific Partner of SU2C. They are Nobel Laureate Elizabeth H. Blackburn, PhD, of the University of California San Francisco;...
The Cancer Research Institute honored three scientists for their work in immunology and cancer immunotherapy at the group’s annual gala held recently in New York. Padmanee Sharma, MD, PhD, Professor of Genitourinary Medical Oncology and Immunology at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer...
Oncologist and Professor Ignacio I. Wistuba, MD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, has been recognized by the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (IASLC) with a Distinguished Award at the IASLC 19th World Conference on Lung Cancer (WCLC) in Toronto. Dr....
The European Society for medical oncology (ESMO) has granted the 2018 ESMO Award to Jean-Charles Soria, MD, PhD, an international lung cancer expert and pioneer in the development of anticancer drugs. The award was founded in 1985 to acknowledge an ESMO member who has made contributions to the...