Kathleen N. Moore, MD, Associate Professor of Gynecologic Oncology and Director of the Oklahoma TSET Phase I Clinical Trials Program, Stephenson Cancer Center, Oklahoma City, underscored the importance of studying patients with stable disease and less robust partial response, not just those with...
An updated analysis of the phase III VELIA/GOG-3005 trial, presented during the 2020 Society of Gynecologic Oncology (SGO) Annual Meeting on Women’s Cancer Webinar Series,1 suggested synergy between the poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor veliparib and platinum chemotherapy in the...
On April 29, 2020, niraparib was approved for maintenance treatment of adult patients with advanced epithelial ovarian, fallopian tube, or primary peritoneal cancer who are in complete or partial response to first-line platinum-based chemotherapy.1,2 Supporting Efficacy Data Approval was based on...
Thomas J. Herzog, MD, Deputy Director, University of Cincinnati Cancer Center, who presented a distillation of the PAOLA-1 trial findings along with updated results of the PRIMA trial, called the difference in progression-free survival with the addition of olaparib to bevacizumab “remarkable” after ...
Proponents of combining bevacizumab with poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibition to treat advanced ovarian cancer now have more data to support the maintenance regimen, according to an updated analysis of the phase III PAOLA-1 trial presented during the 2020 Society of Gynecologic Oncology...
Formal discussant of KEYNOTE-555, Siwen Hu-Lieskovan, MD, PhD, of Huntsman Cancer Institute, Salt Lake City, commented on the advantages of the new schedule. “Along with the promise of prolonged survival associated with checkpoint inhibitors, convenience, quality of life, and reducing health-care...
A less-frequent, more-convenient dosing schedule for pembrolizumab (400 mg every 6 weeks) was deemed safe and effective in patients with unresectable or metastatic melanoma, according to interim data from cohort B enrolled in the KEYNOTE-555 trial. These findings were presented at the 2020 Virtual...
An American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network (ACS CAN) survey of patients with cancer and survivors, conducted in May 2020, focused on COVID-19 effects. Compared with a survey conducted in April 2020, 87% of respondents said the pandemic had affected their health care, up from 51% in the...
“PARP inhibitors are a major advance in the treatment of BRCA1- and BRCA2-mutated tumors, including prostate, breast, ovarian, and pancreatic cancers,” said discussant Susan Domchek, MD, Director of the Basser Center for BRCA at Penn Medicine’s Abramson Cancer Center in Philadelphia. Nevertheless,...
The poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase inhibitor talazoparib did not improve overall survival in women with metastatic HER2-negative breast cancer and mutations in the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes, according to new results from the phase III EMBRACA trial presented at the 2020 American Association for Cancer...
A team of data scientists and oncologists from the University of Michigan and Pennsylvania State University have developed a free, Web-based application to help in comparing the long-term risk to a patient from a months-long postponement of care to the additional risk posed by potential COVID-19...
Study discussant David G. Huntsman, MD, Founder and Chief Medical Officer of Contextual Genomics, noted the positive predictive value of DETECT-A was 19%, which increased to 41% with the addition of positron-emission tomography/computed tomography. He pointed out that most cancers detected by the...
A large, “first-of-its-kind” trial showed that a blood test could identify cancers in women with no history of cancer and who were asymptomatic. Of about 10,000 women enrolled in the study, 134 had positive results on blood screening; 26 of these women were found to have cancers. Conventional...
Discussant of the CCGA study, David Huntsman, MD, Founder and Chief Medical Officer of Contextual Genomics, said: “Screening is the peak [for the number of people who could benefit from early detection], but screening is the most challenging. It requires high sensitivity and specificity that is...
A blood test based on cell-free DNA was able to detect cancer as well as the site of origin in patients with a clinical suspicion of cancer, according to results of the Circulating Cell-Free Genome Atlas (CCGA) study presented at the 2020 American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Virtual...
The American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) has recognized Phillip A. Sharp, PhD, Fellow of the AACR Academy and Nobel Laureate, with the 17th AACR Award for Lifetime Achievement in Cancer Research. Dr. Sharp is Professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s David H. Koch Institute...
The Sarcoma Foundation of America (SFA), an organization dedicated to increasing research and awareness for sarcoma, announced it has awarded $750,000 in research funds to scientists as part of its 2020 SFA Research Grant program. Fifteen grants, each worth $50,000, have been awarded to researchers ...
The American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) announced the awarding of the 2020 AACR–Irving Weinstein Foundation Distinguished Lectureship to Barbara J. Wold, PhD. Dr. Wold was recently appointed as Director of the Merkin Institute for Translational Research at the California Institute of...
The American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) has recognized Tyler Jacks, PhD, Fellow of the AACR Academy, with the 2020 AACR Princess Takamatsu Memorial Lectureship. Dr. Jacks is Director of the David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at Massachusetts Institute of Technology...
Formal discussant Yvonne Chen, PhD, Associate Professor of Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics at the University of California, Los Angeles, said the issue of toxicity was important, since high levels of toxicity were observed in this small group of five patients. “All five patients...
Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy known as TruUCAR GC027 may prove to be useful in the treatment of adult patients with relapsed or refractory T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (T-ALL) and potentially other hematologic malignancies. Preliminary results in a small number of patients...
ASCO recently released a new evidence-based guideline regarding the clinical management of cancer cachexia in adults with advanced cancer.1 The guideline is the result of a literature review that included 20 systematic reviews and 13 randomized clinical trials. An expert panel was convened to...
Two gynecologic oncologists and ASCO’s Chief Medical Officer and Executive Vice President Richard L. Schilsky, MD, FACP, FSCT, FASCO, commented on the findings of the TROPHIMMUN trial for The ASCO Post. “The authors demonstrate efficacy of a new treatment approach for gestational trophoblastic...
Assisted suicide gets a lot of press, as if it were a new event. About 20 to 30 years ago, it was ever present but neither defined nor acknowledged. When patients left the hospital for what they and I believed to be the last time, I did one or both of two things: gave them my home number or, if...
In the fall of 2015, I was looking forward to a trip to Florida for a visit with my daughter and her family, along with a little relaxation. The evening before the trip, I experienced some abdominal pain that my wife, Angela, and I thought might be appendicitis. Concerned the problem could...
Long-term cancer-related cognitive impairment reported among women with early breast cancer receiving adjuvant endocrine therapy with or without chemotherapy “should alert clinicians to the importance of ongoing symptom monitoring among this large population of cancer survivors who receive at least ...
Women with early-stage breast cancer who received adjuvant chemoendocrine therapy reported greater cognitive impairment at 3 and 6 months than women receiving adjuvant endocrine therapy alone, according to the results from a subgroup of women participating in the TAILORx trial.1 By 12 months, the...
The ASCO Post is pleased to reproduce installments of Art of Oncology as published previously in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. These articles focus on the experience of suffering from cancer or of caring for people diagnosed with cancer, and they include narratives, topical essays, historical...
On May 29, 2020, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved two combination regimens: ramucirumab (Cyramza) was approved in combination with erlotinib for the first-line treatment of patients with metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)...
Breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer death among women worldwide. As populations age, the incidence of cancer inevitably increases—the World Health Organization has predicted a dramatic increase in global breast cancer cases during the next 15 years. Moreover, breast cancer is increasing in ...
On may 8, 2020, selpercatinib was granted accelerated approval for the following indications: Adult patients with metastatic RET fusion-positive non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) Adult and pediatric patients ≥ 12 years of age with advanced or metastatic RET-mutant medullary thyroid cancer who...
The Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center—Jefferson Health (SKCC) recently announced that Andrew E. Aplin, PhD, was being recognized with the Melanoma Research Foundation Humanitarian Award. Dr. Aplin is the Kalbach-Newton Professor in Cancer Research, Enterprise Associate Director for Basic Research, and...
Discussant Scott T. Tagawa, MD, MS, of Weill Cornell Medicine, New York, agreed that prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA)-targeted positron-emission tomography (PET) is the wave of the future, but data on long-term outcomes are needed, he said. “We are all aware of the deficiencies of imaging ...
Ursula A. Matulonis, MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, discusses three important studies focusing on newer therapies for patients with recurrent platinum-sensitive, platinum-agnostic, and advanced recurrent ovarian cancers (Abstracts 6003, 6004, and 6005).
Leora Horn, MD, of Vanderbilt University, discusses the results of the TERAVOLT study, launched by the Thoracic Cancers International COVID-19 Collaboration. It examined the impact of specific chemotherapy and immunotherapy regimens on hospitalization and risk of death in patients with thoracic...
Daniel P. Petrylak, MD, of the Yale Cancer Center, discusses early data on ARV-110, an androgen receptor proteolysis–targeting chimera degrader, demonstrating antitumor activity in metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer after treatment with enzalutamide and abiraterone (Abstract 3500).
Andres Poveda, MD, of Initia Oncology, discusses phase III results from the SOLO2 trial, which showed that, compared with placebo, maintenance olaparib improved median overall survival by 12.9 months in patients with platinum-sensitive, relapsed ovarian cancer and a BRCA mutation (Abstract 6002).
On April 21, 2020, ibrutinib was granted an expanded indication for use in combination with rituximab for the initial treatment of adult patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) or small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL).1,2 The recommended dosage of ibrutinib in CLL/SLL is 420 mg, once daily,...
The National Comprehensive Cancer Network® (NCCN®) and the NCCN Foundation announced five new recipients for the 10th annual NCCN Foundation Young Investigator Awards Program. The honorees will receive up to $150,000 in funding to study ways to improve care and help find cures for people with...
GUEST EDITORS Dr. Abutalib is Associate Director of the Hematology and Cellular Therapy Program and Director of the Clinical Apheresis Program at Cancer Treatment Centers of America, Zion, Illinois; Associate Professor at the Roseland Franklin University of Medicine and Science; and Founder and...
Carlos L. Arteaga, MD, is Director of the Harold C. Simmons Cancer Center and Associate Dean for Oncology Programs, UT Southwestern Medical Center (UTSW), Dallas. He is an expert in breast cancer who has authored more than 350 publications in the areas of oncogenes in breast tumors, targeted...
Howard A. Burris III, MD, FACP, FASCO, Immediate Past President of ASCO and current Society Board Chair, talks about how the meeting went, with its record-breaking attendance and new format.
Positron-emission tomography/computed tomography (PET/CT) imaging with the prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA)-targeted radiotracer fluorine F-18 DCFPyL (PyL) successfully identified areas of occult metastasis in men with biochemically recurrent metastatic castration-resistant prostate...
On May 8, 2020, olaparib was granted an expanded indication to include use in combination with bevacizumab for first-line maintenance treatment of adult patients with advanced epithelial ovarian, fallopian tube, or primary peritoneal cancer who are in complete or partial response to first-line...
According to the results of a European case-control study published by Molina-Montes et al in the journal Gut, one of the most recently identified types of diabetes—type 3c, or pancreatogenic diabetes—could also be an early manifestation of pancreatic cancer. Pancreatic cancer has a high mortality...
Between 2001 and 2016 in the United States, Asian/Pacific Islander men experienced the greatest increase in the incidence of testicular germ cell tumors, followed by Hispanic and American Indian/Alaska Native men, according to a study published by Ghazarian et al in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers...
A safety and patient-reported outcome analysis from the IMpower150 trial, reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Martin Reck, PhD, and colleagues, indicated that atezolizumab plus bevacizumab and chemotherapy appeared to be a manageable and tolerable regimen when compared with atezolizumab ...
Nurse-scientists from the Phyllis F. Cantor Center for Research in Nursing and Patient Care Services at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, received more than $1.3 million in funding for two separate research projects. The American Association for Cancer Research announced that in partnership...
The University of Kentucky Markey Cancer Center announced that medical sociologist Pamela Hull, PhD, will join the center as Associate Director of Population Science and Community Impact. She will also serve as the William Stamps Farish Endowed Chair in Cancer Research and join the University of...
In a Dutch study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Markar et al found that routine use of minimally invasive vs open esophagectomy for esophageal cancer was associated with increased risk of pulmonary complications and other adverse outcomes, contrary to the findings of the clinical...