Nicholas D. James, PhD, MBBS, of The Institute of Cancer Research in London, discusses the health economics of adding abiraterone to first-line, long-term hormone therapy in prostate cancer, and what it means for long-term survival, quality-adjusted survival, and cost-effectiveness (Abstract 204).
The ASH 2019 Annual Meeting & Exposition featured countless important sessions and lectures. It would be impossible to attend all the symposia, oral presentations, poster presentations, and special events. Below, we have selected some presentation highlights to supplement our coverage of the...
Javier Pinilla-Ibarz, MD, PhD, Moffitt Cancer Center, Tampa, Florida, commented on this study: “ELEVATE TN compared front-line treatment with acalabrutinib alone or in combination with obinutuzumab vs obinutuzumab/chlorambucil and showed that a second-generation Bruton’s tyrosine kinase (BTK)...
The second-generation Bruton’s tyrosine kinase (BTK) inhibitor acalabrutinib, alone, or in combination with obinutuzumab significantly improved progression-free survival compared with a standard combination of obinutuzumab/chlorambucil in treatment-naive patients with chronic lympocytic leukemia...
In findings of the SEQUOIA trial and updated results of the AU-003 trial,1,2 zanubrutinib, a Bruton’s tyrosine inhibitor (BTK), was shown to produce high overall response rates for patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) and small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL), even in the presence of...
Thierry Facon, MD, of Lille University Hospital in France, and Michael Jain, MD, PhD, of Moffitt Cancer Center, Tampa, were interviewed by The ASCO Post on the second-generation chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell products for treating multiple myeloma. According to Dr. Facon, essentially...
Two novel dual-target chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell strategies are yielding early and durable responses for patients with relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma, as well as potentially less cytokine-release syndrome and neurotoxicity compared with first-generation CAR T-cell products,...
Two separate studies are investigating brentuximab vedotin plus nivolumab combination therapy for adults with Hodgkin lymphoma: one as first-line therapy and another as salvage therapy for relapsed/refractory classic disease, according to data presented at the 2019 Annual Meeting & Exposition...
FT596, a novel off-the-shelf chimeric antigen receptor natural killer cell (CAR-NK) product, was as effective as existing CAR T-cell platforms in killing cancer cells in vivo, and the combination of FT596 plus rituximab killed lymphoma cancer cells that were no longer responding to CAR T-cell...
Mosunetuzumab, an investigational bispecific antibody, demonstrated activity in preliminary studies of patients with non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL), including those who are refractory to or relapsed after third-line chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy. With further study, mosunetuzumab,...
Commenting on the Children’s Oncology Group AALL1331 study, Howard J. Weinstein, MD, Chief of Pediatric HematologyOncology at Massachusetts General Hospital for Children and Harvard Medical School in Boston, said: “These are very promising results for children, adolescents, and young adults who...
Among children, adolescents, and young adults with B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), the bispecific T-cell engager blinatumomab improved event-free survival and overall survival, compared with standard chemotherapy, as post-reinduction consolidation therapy at first relapse prior to...
Basem M. William, MD, MRCP (UK), FACP, Director of the T-Cell Lymphoma Program and Member of the Blood and Marrow Transplant Program at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center, Columbus, said many of the new-generation bispecific antibodies are “highly promising.” He said they “are...
Are second-generation bispecific antibodies the next big thing in lymphoma? Studies of these drugs were among the highlights of the 2019 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition. Years ago, the bispecific T-cell engager blinatumomab validated the concept of bispecific...
More than 25,000 specialists in hematology from over 115 countries attended the 61st American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition held last December in Orlando. The conference featured a stunning array of 4,900 abstracts with impressive new data in the treatment of multiple...
Ziad Bakouny, MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, discusses two types of renal cell cancer that are associated with poor prognosis. Because recent early data suggest these tumors respond well to immune checkpoint inhibitors, the authors characterized the tumors in an integrative molecular and...
Toni K. Choueiri, MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, describes a currently recruiting phase III study (COSMIC-313) of cabozantinib in combination with nivolumab and ipilimumab vs nivolumab/ipilimumab for patients with previously untreated advanced renal cell carcinoma of intermediate or poor risk ...
Hannah L. Rush, MBChB, of the Clinical Trials Unit at University College London, discusses an analysis of the STAMPEDE trial, which showed that patients treated with abiraterone had higher scores in global quality of life as well as in the physical, social, and role function domains and lower...
Nizar M. Tannir, MD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses overall survival and an independent review of response in CheckMate 214 with 42-month follow-up, using first-line nivolumab plus ipilimumab vs sunitinib in patients with advanced renal cell carcinoma (Abstract 609).
Thomas Powles, MD, PhD, of Queen Mary University of London, summarizes two papers on metastatic renal cell carcinoma for which he was the discussant: nivolumab in combination with stereotactic body radiotherapy in pretreated patients, and combining dual immune checkpoint inhibition with...
Karim Fizazi, MD, PhD, of the Institut Gustave Roussy, discusses results from the CARD study, which showed that cabazitaxel improved pain, time to pain progression, and symptomatic skeletal events, as well as quality of life in patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer. The...
Nicholas D. James, PhD, MBBS, of The Institute of Cancer Research in London, discusses results from a phase I/II feasibility study that showed the combination of cetuximab, chemoradiation, fluorouracil, and mitomycin yields high bladder cancer control rates with acceptable toxicity and quality of...
Maha Hussain, MD, of the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center of Northwestern University, discusses the first phase III clinical trial to demonstrate the feasibility of tissue-based genomic testing to preselect men with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer for targeted treatment...
Neeraj Agarwal, MD, of the University of Utah Huntsman Cancer Institute, discusses trial findings that showed the combination of cabozantinib and atezolizumab had a tolerable safety profile and showed activity in men with metastatic disease. Further evaluation of cabozantinib and atezolizumab is...
Toni K. Choueiri, MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, discusses findings from a phase I/II trial that found MK-6482 was well tolerated and demonstrated activity in heavily pretreated patients with clear cell renal cell carcinoma (Abstract 611).
David P. Dearnaley, MD, of The Institute of Cancer Research and Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, discusses 8-year outcomes of the phase III CHHiP trial, which showed that modest hypofractionation is noninferior to conventional fractionation in localized prostate cancer, with no increase in side...
Ziad Bakouny, MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, discusses the controversial and ill-defined role of cytoreductive nephrectomy in treating patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma who have received targeted therapies or immune checkpoint inhibitors (Abstract 608).
Julie N. Graff, MD, of Oregon Health & Science University and Knight Cancer Institute, discusses study findings that show pembrolizumab plus enzalutamide after progression on enzalutamide produced clinical activity and can lead to durable responses, with a manageable safety profile. The phase...
The addition of the checkpoint inhibitor atezolizumab to chemotherapy with carboplatin and nab-paclitaxel failed to significantly improve pathologic complete response rates compared with chemotherapy alone in patients with early high-risk, locally advanced triple-negative breast cancer. According...
In a study published by Frankenfeld et al in Cancer Epidemiology, researchers found racial disparities in how the presence of cancer-related diagnostic and treatment technology is related to colorectal cancer patient outcomes in Georgia. The findings suggest that the hospital capacity and...
A comprehensive molecular study of endometrial cancer published by Dou et al in Cell has further defined the contributions of key genes and proteins to the disease. The overview suggests new treatment approaches that could be tailored for each patient, as well as potential biologic targets for...
As reported in JAMA Oncology, Nima Sharifi, MD, and colleagues have found that the adrenal-permissive HSD3B1 genotype is associated with earlier onset of castration resistance and poorer overall survival in men with low-volume metastatic prostate cancer. As noted by the investigators, the...
In a retrospective analysis reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Fatobene et al found that nonmyeloablative haploidentical related donor cell transplantation was associated with better outcomes compared to unrelated cord blood hematopoietic transplantation in patients with Hodgkin and...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology, Lecia V. Sequist, MD, and colleagues have found activity and an acceptable risk-benefit profile with the combination of the third-generation EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitor osimertinib and the MET tyrosine kinase inhibitor savolitinib in patients with EGFR...
Syed A. Hussain, MD, of the University of Sheffield, discusses phase II findings comparing nintedanib or placebo in combination with gemcitabine and cisplatin in locally advanced muscle-invasive bladder cancer. The data showed that adding nintedanib was safe and well tolerated, with a significant...
Jonathan E. Rosenberg, MD, of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, discusses study results which showed that, in first-line cisplatin-ineligible patients with metastatic urothelial carcinoma, enfortumab vedotin/pembrolizumab demonstrated activity and durability, with a manageable safety profile...
Treatment of patients with cholangiocarcinoma could be improved by tailoring medication to the levels of a key protein in people with the disease, according to new research published by Kitchen et al in Cancer Research. Researchers have discovered that the proline-rich homeodomain...
A new study found a wide state-by-state variation in rates of melanoma caused by ultraviolet (UV) exposure, with highest rates in several states on the east and west coasts (including Hawaii), but also a few landlocked states (including Utah, Vermont, and Minnesota). The report, published by Islami ...
ASCO and Cancer Care Ontario (CCO) have published an update to a joint guideline on systemic therapy for stage IV non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) without driver mutations.1 “The treatment of stage IV NSCLC has become increasingly more complicated, and, with the advent of immunotherapy and the...
Andrea Wang-Gillam, MD, PhD, Clinical Director of the GI Oncology Program and Director of Developmental Therapeutics at Washington University in St. Louis, was the invited discussant of SEQUOIA and HALO 109-301. She tried to make sense of the two negative studies of pegylated agents in advanced...
Two novel treatments once thought to hold promise in the treatment of metastatic pancreatic cancer have not proved to be effective in phase III trials, investigators reported at the 2020 Gastrointestinal Cancers Symposium. When combined with standard chemotherapy, a pegylated form of human...
A multi-institutional retrospective study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Shitanshu Uppal, MBBS, and colleagues showed that minimally invasive radical hysterectomy was associated with a higher risk of disease recurrence vs open abdominal hysterectomy in women undergoing surgery for...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Bridgewater et al, the phase III New EPOC trial has shown that the addition of perioperative cetuximab to chemotherapy was associated with significantly poorer overall survival in patients with KRAS wild-type resectable colorectal cancer liver metastases. An...
As reported in JAMA Oncology by Rita Nanda, MD, and colleagues, findings from the ongoing phase II I-SPY 2 trial indicated that the addition of pembrolizumab to standard neoadjuvant chemotherapy improved pathologic complete response rates in patients with high-risk stage II/III HER2-negative breast ...
First, we’ll discuss a Korean trial that looked at the role of H pylori infection and gastric cancer risk. Next, we’ll turn to a modeling study that examined HPV vaccination and cervical cancer incidence in low-income and lower–middle-income countries. Last this week, we’ll look at data presented...
This week, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted Priority Review to agents in lymphoma, lung cancer, gastrointestinal stromal tumors, and breast cancer, and granted Fast Track designation to a first-in-class radioenhancer hafnium oxide nanoparticle in head and neck cancer. Priority...
According to results from a phase II trial presented by Johann S. de Bono, MD, PhD, and colleagues at the 2020 Genitourinary (GU) Cancers Symposium (Abstract 119), treatment with the poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor talazoparib showed antitumor activity in patients with metastatic...
In patients with metastatic urothelial carcinoma, platinum chemotherapy is the standard of care in the first-line setting; however, for patients who are ineligible for platinum treatment, the alternative standard—gemcitabine plus carboplatin—can be poorly tolerated and have limited durability and...
In a phase I/II trial reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Liu et al found that anti-CD19 chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) natural killer (NK) cells produced rapid responses in patients with CD19-positive lymphoid tumors, without the toxicities associated with CAR T-cell therapy in this...
In a study reported in JCO Oncology Practice, Failing et al found that influenza vaccination did not increase the incidence of immune-related adverse events among patients receiving pembrolizumab for various cancers. On multivariate analysis, influenza vaccination was associated with a...