In 2003, Nina Kadan-Lottick, MD, MSPH, established the regional Yale HEROS multidisciplinary research and clinical program for long-term survivors of childhood cancer survivors, which is the first of its kind in Connecticut and one of the first in the United States. She intends the HEROS program to ...
In 1980, Paul G. Marks, MD, became the President and Chief Executive Officer of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK), the oldest and largest private cancer center in the world. Over his 19-year reign, he is credited with setting MSK on a more scientific course by encouraging innovative...
Most who leave a mark in life are noted for a single contribution; few are remembered for the breadth of their contributions. Such a man was John W. Yarbro, MD, PhD, who, near the end of his rich life, stepped foot on Antarctica, completing his desire to have visited all of the world’s seven...
My journey in cancer medicine started in June 1968, when I traveled from Lebanon to New York to begin my fellowship in medical oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. Since then, and on a daily basis, I have been actively engaged in the treatment of patients with cancer and in cancer...
The human drama within the oncology world is a never-ending story of triumph, tragedy, and all of the valiant efforts and human emotions in between. The doctor-patient relationship in oncology is deeper and longer than in most medical specialties due to the life-and-death stakes at play after a...
The text and photograph here are excerpted from a four-volume series of books titled Oncology: Tumors & Treatment, A Photographic History, The Radium Era: 1916–1945 by Stanley B. Burns, MD, FACS, and Elizabeth A. Burns. The photograph appears courtesy of Stanley B. Burns, MD, and The Burns...
During the COVID-19 pandemic, The ASCO Post will be interviewing oncologists on how they and their centers are dealing with the crisis. Here, we speak with Alexander Melamed, MD, MPH, a gynecologic oncologist and Assistant Professor of Obstetrics & Gynecology at NewYork-Presbyterian/Columbia...
G. David Roodman, MD, PhD, of Indiana University (IU) Melvin and Bren Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center, has been awarded a 5-year, $1.6 million grant from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to study ways to build bone and decrease tumor growth in multiple myeloma bone disease. Dr. Roodman is...
Yale Cancer Center has announced the appointment of Robert Bona, MD, as Professor of Medicine (Hematology) and inaugural Director of the Benign Hematology Program at Smilow Cancer Hospital. He will also join as Medical Director of the Hemophilia Treatment Center for the Pediatric Hematology &...
Florida Cancer Specialists & Research Institute of Lake Mary, Florida has announced that medical oncologist Martin F. Dietrich, MD, PhD, has joined the cancer specialty group. Dr. Dietrich is Board-certified in internal medicine and medical oncology. In his clinical practice, he addresses all...
In this edition of the Living a Full Life series, guest editor Jame Abraham, MD, FACP, spoke with John Craig Venter, PhD, Founder, Chairman, and Chief Executive Officer of the J. Craig Venter Institute, a nonprofit organization dedicated to human, microbial, and environmental genomic research. A...
The Yale Cancer Center has announced the appointments of Thomas Prebet, MD, PhD, as Disease Aligned Research Team (DART) Leader for Myeloid Malignancies and Amer Zeidan, MBBS, as Director of the Hematology Early Therapeutics Program. In these new roles, Drs. Prebet and Zeidan will work closely with ...
City of Hope has announced the addition of pathologist Stanley Hamilton, MD, and researcher Alexey Danilov, MD, PhD, to the National Medical Center in Duarte, California. Dr. Hamilton is a recognized leader in pathology who helped develop pathology and laboratory medicine into a world-class...
The Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute recently announced that breast surgeon Eric A. Brown, MD, FACS, has joined its medical team. Board-certified in general surgery and breast ultrasound, Dr. Brown will serve as co-leader of the Breast Cancer Multidisciplinary Team, alongside Michael Simon,...
Pulling together the 2020 American Association of Cancer Research (AACR) Virtual Annual Meeting in less than 1 month was a Herculean task, and an important component was producing a session on COVID-19 and cancer care. This special session involved researchers from the front lines of the pandemic...
When I chose my Presidential theme for the 2020 ASCO Annual Meeting, “Unite and Conquer: Accelerating Progress Together,” in early 2019, I never imagined it would take on a new meaning 12 months later. The world is grappling with the COVID-19 pandemic, and, even as we practice social distancing, I...
As Thomas Powles, MD, PhD, of Queen Mary University of London, prepares to deliver his late-breaking presentation at the ASCO20 Virtual Scientific Program (LBA-1), he talks with Christopher Sweeney, MBBS, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, about current therapy: PD1/PDL1 inhibition in second-line...
Over the last decade, researchers have become concerned about a possible link between a benign gynecologic lesion called endosalpingiosis and ovarian cancer. However, using a diagnostic method typically reserved for specimens suspected of being cancerous, a team has found the prevalence of...
In a study reported in a research letter in JAMA Oncology, Fumiko Chino, MD, and colleagues found that while the incidence of opioid-related death has increased in both the general population and in patients with cancer in recent years, opioid-related death is far less common among individuals with ...
AS I WRITE TO YOU, I am happy to report I have just completed a 7-day rotation at the COVID-19 inpatient service at my hospital in New York City! Overall, it was a positive experience, despite the occasional sad and scary moments. I left the service feeling uplifted and fulfilled. I am glad to have ...
A study of 4,532 men in the Veneto region of Italy has found that those who were being treated for prostate cancer with androgen-deprivation therapies (ADT) were less likely to develop COVID-19, and if they were infected, their disease tended to be less severe. This research was published by...
Although the live 2020 National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) Annual Conference was canceled, more than 100 posters scheduled for presentation are now available online, as part of the NCCN 2020 Virtual Annual Conference. The ASCO Post has summarized some of the clinical trial updates we found ...
Mikkael A. Sekeres, MD, of the Cleveland Clinic, talks about the ways in which social distancing and viral fears have affected the way he delivers treatment for his patients, as well as the effect on their psyches—and his. Recorded April 10, 2020.
Commenting on the SOLO2 trial for The ASCO Post was Don S. Dizon, MD, FACP, FASCO, Director of Women’s Cancers at Lifespan Cancer Institute and Professor of Medicine at Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island. “It’s great to get an overall survival advantage from a PARP inhibitor study. Coming...
The COVID-19 pandemic transformed cancer care, seemingly overnight, as practices scrambled to ensure a safe environment for caregivers and patients. Although regulatory burdens have been relaxed to allow patients to continue on trial treatment and telemedicine has expanded its competency and reach, ...
Mikkael A. Sekeres, MD, of the Cleveland Clinic, talks about the ways in which social distancing and viral fears have affected the way he delivers treatment for his patients, as well as the effect on their psyches—and his. Recorded April 10, 2020.
The universe has an intriguing way of registering our wishes and delivering them in convoluted, mutated forms. Last winter, I recall coming home after a long day at the hospital and being ambushed by my 3-year-old daughter and preteen son. She wanted to play, he needed help with homework, and they ...
People who received information from the Screen to Save program, a culturally tailored initiative from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) Center to Reduce Cancer Health Disparities (CRCHD), increased their knowledge of colorectal cancer and indicated willingness to adopt potentially preventive...
Fox Chase Cancer Center announced that Andres F. Correa, MD, has joined the Department of Surgery in the Urologic Oncology Division as Assistant Professor. Dr. Correa, w ho was a Society of Urologic Oncology Fellow at Fox Chase, is returning to the center after serving as Attending Surgeon and...
The Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy (PICI) recently announced the appointment of Frederic Pla, PhD, as its Chief Operating Officer (COO). Dr. Pla will lead day-to-day operations and work with the Institute’s leadership team to establish goals for performance, expansion, and sustainable...
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 American Cancer Society (ACS) has approved funding for 79 research and training grants, totaling $36,165,100 in the first of two grant cycles for 2020. Grant applications were reviewed and approved remotely in light of the coronavirus epidemic. The grants will fund investigators at 59...
Timothy Chan, MD, PhD, has been appointed Director of the Center for Immunotherapy and Precision Immuno-Oncology at Cleveland Clinic. Dr. Chan will lead the new center to bring together multidisciplinary experts from across the Cleveland Clinic enterprise to advance research and treatment related...
Omid Hamid, MD, Chief of Research/Immuno-Oncology, The Angeles Clinic & Research Institute, and Co-Director of the Cutaneous Malignancy Program at Cedars-Sinai Cancer Center, Los Angeles, commented on these two studies for The ASCO Post. According to Dr. Hamid, the findings for the tumor...
Grant A. McArthur, MBBS, PhD, of the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, discusses phase III results from a study of previously untreated patients with BRAF V600 mutation–positive advanced melanoma. His team evaluated whether combining vemurafenib and cobimetinib with atezolizumab improved the...
In a special report published by Malcovati et al in the journal Blood, an international working group of experts in myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) has proposed the recognition of a distinct subtype of MDS based on the presence of a nonheritable genetic mutation that causes the disease. The...
A randomized multicenter study of a combination of immunotherapy with a targeted therapy improved cancer control for some patients with biliary tract cancer, according to research presented by Yarchoan et al at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Virtual Annual Meeting (Abstract...
Christopher D'Avella, MD, of Fox Chase Cancer Center, discusses the impact of his institution’s oncologic urgent care center, designed to triage patients and prevent hospital admissions. Patients who presented to the direct referral unit had lower health-care expenses vs those who went to the...
Rafal Dziadziuszko, MD, PhD, of the Medical University of Gdansk, talks about the adjustments to cancer care that he and his colleagues have made, how and when they employ telemedicine, and whether the technology could change the future for clinical practice. Filmed April 24, 2020.
Rafal Dziadziuszko, MD, PhD, of the Medical University of Gdansk, discusses the concerns his patients with cancer have about exposure to COVID-19 when they come to his institution for care and how he manages their fears. Filmed April 24, 2020.
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is perhaps the biggest challenge health-care systems have ever had to face. As part of a series of interviews The ASCO Post is conducting with oncologists, we talked with Charles G. Drake, MD, PhD, about the impact of COVID-19 on his practice and on the conduct...
Before the dawn of the modern antibiotic era and amid the chaos of World War II, future Professor of Radiology and Founding Dean of two American medical colleges, Dr. George T. Harrell,* penned what could now be argued was far too bold a statement. As the opening lines of his nonrandomized study...
Jacek Jassem, MD, PhD, of the Medical University of Gdansk, and an international editor on The ASCO Post Editorial Board, talks about the situation in Poland, how his institution is coping, and the adjustments the staff has made to deliver quality cancer care. Filmed April 17, 2020.
ASCO and Conquer Cancer, the ASCO Foundation®, are proud to recognize the winners of ASCO’s 2020 Special Awards and Conquer Cancer’s Women Who Conquer Cancer Mentorship Awards. The recipients of these awards have worked to transform cancer care around the world. David A. Karnofsky Memorial Award...
On March 31, 2020, the US Oncology Network (The Network) named cancer researcher Robert L. Coleman, MD, FACOG, FACS, as its new Chief Scientific Officer. In this role, Dr. Coleman will be the senior-most clinician scientist on The US Oncology Network leadership. Dr. Coleman, who most recently...
Mehra Golshan, MD, MBA, FACS, has been appointed the inaugural Deputy Chief Medical Officer for Surgical Services at Smilow Cancer Hospital and Yale Cancer Center, Professor of Surgery at Yale School of Medicine, and Interim Director of the Breast Center at Smilow Cancer Hospital. As Deputy Chief...
The results from the first in-human phase I clinical trial in the United States evaluating CRISPR-Cas9–edited T cells in patients with advanced cancer has shown that the therapy is both feasible and safe, representing a big step forward in the potential of using gene editing to boost the natural...
Inhibitors of cyclin-dependent kinases 4 and 6 (CDK4/6) have changed the natural history of hormone receptor–positive metastatic breast cancer. While median progression-free survival on these drugs is approximately 27 months, the disease eventually progresses and clinicians must choose a subsequent ...
Novel antibody-drug conjugates that target actionable cell-surface markers in metastatic breast cancer will soon expand the utility of the class that already includes ado-trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1), according to two speakers at the 2020 Miami Breast Cancer Conference. These new agents were...
Can patients with cancer and preexisting autoimmune disorders safely benefit from immunotherapy? The answer has been unclear, with only retrospective studies and anecdotal reports guiding oncologists. This subpopulation of patients has largely been excluded from clinical trials out of concerns over ...