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Showing 12751 - 12800Management of HER2-Positive Breast Cancer: Business as Usual?
MANAGEMENT OF HER2-positive breast cancer changed after the introduction of trastuzumab (Herceptin), the first anti-HER2 therapy to be approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for this type of cancer. Recent studies have more clearly defined the role of pertuzumab (Perjeta) and...
Expert Point of View: Rebecca Dent, MD, and Suzette Delaloge, MD, MSc
FORMAL DISCUSSANT of the ACE trial, Rebecca Dent, MD, of the National Cancer Center in Singapore, commented that the phase II ENCORE 301 study provided proof of concept that a histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitor can reprogram epigenetic changes.1 In that randomized, double-blind,...
HDAC Inhibitor May Overcome Endocrine Resistance in Advanced Breast Cancer
EPIGENETIC CHANGES are associated with the development of cancer, and epigenetic therapy is an attractive strategy for targeting the tumor microenvironment. One approach targeted to epigenetic changes is using histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibition, which has antitumorigenic effects including growth ...
Expert Point of View: Julien Taieb, MD
JULIEN TAIEB, MD, Professor of Medicine at Paris Descartes University in France, said the MODUL cohort was based on a clear rationale for adding atezolizumab (Tecentriq) to bevacizumab (Avastin) in the metastatic colorectal cancer setting. In immunodeficient mice, the combination of an...
No Benefit for Atezolizumab Plus Standard of Care for Maintenance in Colorectal Cancer Subset
ADDING ATEZOLIZUMAB (Tecentriq) to a fluoropyrimidine plus bevacizumab (Avastin) did not improve outcomes for patients with BRAF wild-type metastatic colorectal cancer enrolled in the umbrella MODUL trial.1 “Despite activity in other, immune-responsive tumor types, there was no improvement in...
Expert Point of View: Reinhard Dummer, MD
KEYNOTE-022’S invited discussant, Reinhard Dummer, MD, Professor of Dermatologic Oncology at the University Hospital Zurich Skin Cancer Center in Switzerland, told attendees, “We’ve been waiting for this small prospective randomized phase II trial, and the initial results appear very promising.”...
Pembrolizumab Triplet Shows Activity in BRAF-Mutant Melanoma
AS FIRST-LINE treatment of advanced BRAF-mutant melanoma, pembrolizumab (Keytruda) added to dabrafenib (Tafinlar) and trametinib (Mekinist) produced a nonsignificant improvement in progression-free survival. It also increased the rate of grade 3 to 5 treatment-related adverse events in the phase II ...
Expert Point of View: Joaquin Mateo, MD, PhD
FORMAL DISCUSSANT Joaquin Mateo, MD, PhD, of the Prostate Cancer Translational Research Group, Vall d’Hebron Institute of Oncology, Barcelona, said that the TRITON2 findings were encouraging, although still preliminary. “We should interpret these results with caution, because this interim analysis ...
PARP Inhibitor Active in BRCA1/2-Mutated Metastatic Castration-Resistant Prostate Cancer
THE SEARCH for biomarkers in prostate cancer has proved frustrating, partly due to the complexity of the disease and its heterogeneity. A preliminary analysis of a phase II (TRITON2) study suggests that rucaparib (Rubraca), a poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor, may be active in men with...
Expert Point of View: Manuela Schmidinger, MD
“TARGETED AGENTS were a breakthrough in the treatment of renal cell carcinoma, and immunotherapy also works well, improving survival. In the past 2 years, combining a checkpoint inhibitor with targeted agents appears to work even better, and multiple combination trials are underway. The outcomes...
Progress Made in Identifying Gene-Signature Biomarkers in Renal Cell Carcinoma
A NEW ANALYSIS of the phase III IMmotion151 trial identified gene signatures in renal cell carcinoma that correlate with improved progression-free survival in patients treated with atezolizumab (Tecentriq) plus bevacizumab (Avastin) vs sunitinib (Sutent). These findings were presented at the...
Expert Point of View: Cara Haymaker, PhD
CARA HAYMAKER, PhD, of MD Anderson Cancer Center, said the researchers have made a “crucial” discovery: adoptive cellular therapy can be expanded beyond academic centers and be “taken to the masses.” Tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes can now be manufactured and shipped to patients treated at centers...
Using Tumor‑Infiltrating Lymphocytes to Treat Metastatic Melanoma
STEVEN A. ROSENBERG, MD, PhD, Chief of Surgery at the National Cancer Institute (NCI), began his pioneering research in adoptive cell transfer using interleukin (IL)-2 in the mid-1970s. His IL-2 studies were among the clinical trials that led to the first U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval ...
Expert Point of View: Christina I. Tsien, MD
DISCUSSANT OF the NRG-CC001 trial, Christina I. Tsien, MD, Professor of Radiation Oncology at Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, underscored the importance of this research, noting that cognitive impairment affects nearly 50% of patients who undergo whole-brain radiation therapy. ...
Hippocampus-Sparing Whole-Brain Radiotherapy and Neurocognitive Function in Patients With Brain Metastases
ANALYSIS OF a phase III trial has confirmed that conformal avoidance of the hippocampal dentate gyrus using intensity-modulated radiotherapy during whole-brain radiotherapy for brain metastases preserves neurocognitive function and improves patient-reported symptom burden while achieving similar...
Stereotactic Ablative Radiotherapy May Improve Outcomes in Some Patients With Oligometastatic Tumors
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...
Expert Point of View: Catherine C. Park, MD, FASTRO
DISCUSSANT OF the abstract, Catherine C. Park, MD, FASTRO, Professor and Chair of the Department of Radiation Oncology at the University of California, San Francisco, expressed excitement about this study’s results, which suggest the possibility of curing patients with stage IV disease. “We’re...
Local Consolidative Therapy Associated With Survival Benefit for Some With Oligometastatic NSCLC
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...
Expert Point of View: Laurie H. Sehn, MD
LAURIE H. SEHN, MD, Chair, Lymphoma Tumour Group, BC Cancer Agency, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, said these results are not unexpected and support de-escalation in selected patients. “The FLYER trial evaluates treatment with four cycles compared with six cycles of cyclophosphamide,...
De-escalation of Chemotherapy in Favorable-Risk Diffuse Large B-Cell Lymphoma
THE REGIMEN of four cycles of rituximab (Rituxan)/cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, vincristine, prednisone (R-CHOP) plus two cycles of rituximab was noninferior to that of six cycles of R-CHOP in younger patients with favorable-risk diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), according to the results of...
Beyond Checkpoint Inhibitors: Novel Immunotherapy Combinations With Antitumor Activity
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 ...
Should Oncologists Recommend Cannabis?
A RECENT survey of 400 clinical oncologists found that 80% discuss the use of medical cannabis with their patients, and although nearly 50% recommend it, fewer than 30% consider themselves knowledgeable enough to make such recommendations.1 Oncologists are perhaps among the most evidence-demanding ...
Expert Point of View: Susan M. O’Brien, MD
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...
Ibrutinib vs Standard of Care in Front-Line Treatment of Older Patients With Chronic Lymphocytic Leukemia
IBRUTINIB (IMBRUVICA) as a front-line agent proved superior to standard-of-care chemoimmunotherapy for chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) in older patients in A041202, an Alliance-led National Clinical Trials Network study.1 At a follow-up of 38 months, the median progression-free survival was not ...
SABCS 2018: Oxybutynin for the Management of Hot Flashes in Women Unable to Receive Hormone Replacement Treatment
Treatment with oxybutynin helped reduce the frequency and intensity of hot flashes for women who could not take hormone replacement therapy, including breast cancer survivors, according to the results of a trial presented at the 2018 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium by Leon-Ferre et al (Abstract ...
SABCS 2018: SOLAR-1: Liquid Biopsies in Predicting Benefit of Alpelisib in PIK3CA-Mutant Breast Cancer
Liquid biopsy–based assessment of PIK3CA mutational status served as a better indicator of progression-free survival compared with analysis of tissue biopsy in patients with breast cancer enrolled in the phase III SOLAR-1 clinical trial, according to data presented by Juric et al at the 2018...
SABCS 2018: TAILORx Results Show Association Between Clinical Outcomes in Breast Cancer and Race
An analysis of the association between clinical outcomes and race in participants enrolled in the TAILORx trial found that even with equivalent treatments among women with hormone receptor–positive, HER2-negative breast cancer, black women had worse clinical outcomes than white women, despite ...
A Battle With Leukemia: Part Memoir, Part Oncology History
BOOKMARK Title: Cancer Crossings: A Brother, His Doctors, and the Quest for a Cure to Childhood LeukemiaAuthor: Tim WendelPublisher: ILR PressPublication date: April 2018Price: $24.95, hardcover, 256 pages Tim Wendel is a journalist and author of several noted books, mostly concerning sports. In...
Neurologic Knowledge to Enhance Well-Being and Happiness
BOOKMARK Title: Your Happy Brain: Why and How to Hug ItAuthors: Philomena Lawrence, BA, BEd, and Gilbert Lawrence, MD, FRCRPublisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing PlatformPublication date: June 2018Price: $16.00, paperback, 390 pages Some 2,400 years ago, the ancient Greeks were among the...
St. Baldrick’s Foundation Grants Institutional Funding for Clinical Trials Research in Children With Cancer
To grant more children with cancer access to clinical trials, the St. Baldrick’s Foundation has awarded 29 infrastructure grants totaling $1.7 million to institutions across the country. This series of grants brings the St. Baldrick’s Foundation’s funding total to more than $26 million awarded in...
Sara A. Hurvitz, MD, on HER2-Positive Breast Cancer: Novel Treatments and Markers
Sara A. Hurvitz, MD, of the University of California, Los Angeles, discusses the natural history and novel combinations for HER2-positive disease as well as predictive and prognostic markers for this type of breast cancer.
A Diagnosis of Li-Fraumeni Syndrome Has Focused My Life Direction
Despite the fact that I had to have open heart surgery at age 7 to fix a congenital heart defect and then more surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation therapy to treat a diagnosis of rhabdomyosarcoma a year later, I never felt like I was a sick kid. Children don’t have the existential worries about...
SABCS 2018: Low-Dose Tamoxifen in Reducing Recurrence and New Disease for Patients With Breast Intraepithelial Neoplasia
Treatment with a low dose of tamoxifen (5 mg/d), compared with placebo, decreased the risk of disease recurrence and new disease for women who had been treated with surgery following a diagnosis of breast intraepithelial neoplasia. Moreover, it did not cause more serious adverse events, according...
SABCS 2018: AMAROS Trial: 10-Year Follow-up of Axillary Radiotherapy or Surgery in Early-Stage Breast Cancer
Patients with early-stage breast cancer who had cancer detected in a sentinel lymph node biopsy had comparable 10-year recurrence and survival rates following either axillary radiotherapy or axillary lymph node dissection, according to data from the randomized, phase III AMAROS clinical trial...
SABCS 2018: Circulating Tumor Cell Count May Help Choose First-Line Treatment for Metastatic Breast Cancer
A phase III study by Bidard et al investigated whether circulating tumor cells could help physicians choose between hormone therapy or chemotherapy as front-line therapy for patients with estrogen receptor (ER)-positive, HER2-negative metastatic breast cancer. The researchers concluded that the...
A Feminist Take on Health-Care Disparities
BOOKMARK Title: Doing Harm: The Truth About Bad Medicine and Lazy Science Leave Women Dismissed, Misdiagnosed, and SickAuthor: Maya DusenberyPublisher: HarperOnePublication date: March 2018Price: $27.99, hardcover, 400 pages Over the past year or so, there have been several books by women focused...
Denial’s Many Faces
The ASCO Post is pleased to reproduce installments of the 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,...
The Skin Cancer Foundation Raises $600,000 at Gala
The Skin Cancer Foundation recently held its 22nd annual Gala at The Plaza Hotel in New York. The Champions for Change Gala is the Foundation’s signature fundraising event, and $600,000 was raised to support the organization’s educational campaigns, community programs, and research initiatives....
Pembrolizumab With Chemotherapy for First-Line Treatment of Metastatic Nonsquamous NSCLC
On August 20, 2018, pembrolizumab (Keytruda) in combination with pemetrexed (Alimta) and platinum was granted regular approval as first-line treatment of patients with metastatic nonsquamous non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with no epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) or anaplastic lymphoma...
Addressing Patient Expectations Regarding the Use of Alternative Therapies
Integrative Oncology is guest edited by Jun J. Mao, MD, MSCE, Laurance S. Rockefeller Chair in Integrative Medicine and Chief, Integrative Medicine Service, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York. GUEST EDITOR The ASCO Post’s Integrative Oncology series is intended to facilitate the...
The Chemotherapy Foundation Innovation Gala
This year marks the 50th anniversary of the launch of The Chemotherapy Foundation. Founded by Ezra M. Greenspan, MD, in 1968, with the goal of advancing effective cancer treatments, The Chemotherapy Foundation helped propel the modern era of chemotherapy and the later development of targeted...
Study Finds Poor Adherence to Guidelines in Preventing Chemotherapy-Induced Nausea and Vomiting
Adherence to antiemetic guidelines for the prevention of chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting has been shown to improve patient outcomes. However, a new study suggests that physicians are still struggling to reach attainable adherence targets in antiemetic prophylaxis.1 According to data...
Expert Point of View: Karen M. Mustian, PhD, MS, MPH
Discussant of the ePAL abstract, Karen M. Mustian, PhD, MS, MPH, Professor of Surgery and Director of the PEAK Human Performance Clinical Research Laboratory at the Wilmot Cancer Institute of the University of Rochester Medical Center, emphasized that artificial intelligence is the wave of the...
Artificial Intelligence–Based Smartphone App Decreases Pain and Reduces Inpatient Hospitalizations in Patients With Cancer
A smartphone application utilizing elements of artificial intelligence was associated with improved cancer pain outcomes and a significant reduction in pain-related hospital admissions, according to data presented at the 2018 Palliative and Supportive Care in Oncology Symposium.1 Results of the...
Palliative Care Trailblazer, Charles von Gunten, MD, PhD, Shares Insights With Advanced Practitioners
“The data are in, and they are clear and convincing. Palliative care leads to better outcomes for patients. The major challenge now is to make it part of standard cancer care everywhere in the United States and then everywhere else in the world, said Charles von Gunten, MD, PhD, a medical...
Padmanee Sharma, MD, PhD, Receives Pandolfi Award for Women in Cancer Research
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...
New Glioblastoma Translational Center at Penn Medicine
Penn Medicine has announced a new Translational Center of Excellence in the Abramson Cancer Center, focused on glioblastoma multiforme. The team will investigate new immune therapies for glioblastoma and, in particular, design and test new chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapies. “Penn...
Palliative Care in the Pediatric Oncology Setting
Cancer is the leading cause of disease-related childhood death. To better serve the special needs of this highly vulnerable patient population, pediatric palliative care teams use a personalized, holistic, and interdisciplinary approach tailored to relieve the physical, psychosocial, and spiritual ...
SABCS 2018: Meta-analysis of Pathologic Complete Response and Outcomes in Breast Cancer
Pathologic complete response after neoadjuvant chemotherapy was associated with a significantly lower recurrence risk and higher overall survival in patients with breast cancer, and pathologic complete response after neoadjuvant chemotherapy had a similar association with improved outcomes...
Lynn Sage Breast Cancer Symposium
The 20th Annual Lynn Sage Breast Cancer Symposium was hosted earlier this year by the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center of Northwestern University in Chicago. “A new era of cancer vaccines” and encouraging data from early trials were among the topics discussed by Mary (Nora) Disis, MD...
