German investigators reported at the 2013 Breast Cancer Symposium in San Francisco that an abridged magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) protocol can accurately detect cancers among women whose mammographic screenings were negative.1 MRI, therefore, may reveal the type of tumor that mammography...
Steven J. O’Day, MD, Director of Clinical Research at the Beverly Hills Cancer Center and Adjunct Member of the John Wayne Cancer Institute in Los Angeles, said, “This is an important study. It allows us to feel comfortable with our aggressive approach to the management of DCIS.” Dr. O’Day...
In an e-mail interview, E. Shelley Hwang, MD, an expert who has coauthored several papers on ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), weighed in on the two abstracts about management of DCIS featured in this issue of The ASCO Post—one presented by Melissa L. Pilewskie, MD (perioperative MRI in DCIS, page...
Perioperative MRI for patients with ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) was not associated with a reduction in locoregional recurrence or contralateral breast cancer development in a large single-center study reported at the 2013 ASCO Breast Cancer Symposium. The study also was presented at a...
Larry Norton, MD, of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, is the recipient of the 2013 Gianni Bonadonna Breast Cancer Award, which he received at the 2013 Breast Cancer Symposium. The Symposium is sponsored by ASCO, the American Society of Breast Surgeons, the American Society of Radiation...
In Keynote Lectures during the 2013 ASCO Breast Cancer Symposium, experts George Sledge, MD, and Monica Morrow, MD, offered their opinions and outlook on how the medical and surgical management of breast cancer may continue to evolve over the next 5 to 10 years.1 Dr. Sledge is Chief of Oncology at...
One of the more significant problems in modern oncology practice is to provide increased value at a time when costs are spiraling upward, and new parameters of “success” are being introduced into the equation—most visibly, inside the Beltway in Washington, DC. Thus, oncologists will need to address ...
Prepare for big changes ahead, Lawrence N. Shulman, MD, Senior Vice President for Medical Affairs at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and Harvard Medical School in Boston, told oncologists at the 2013 Breast Cancer Symposium.1 One change is the emergence of...
Women who are currently using calcium channel blockers and have been doing so for 10 or more years are at increased risk of the two most common histologic types of breast cancer, invasive ductal carcinoma and invasive lobular carcinoma, according to a population-based case control study. “While...
Cutaneous melanomas are mostly an immunogenic group of tumors, but they are also heterogeneous. Therefore, therapeutic specificity and autogenetic approaches are essential to secure beneficial results. The objective of sentinel lymph node biopsy, at the time of diagnosis, is to identify patients...
Overestimating the risk that cancer in one breast will affect the other breast may cause many young women with breast cancer to choose contralateral prophylactic mastectomy even though most know it does not clearly improve survival. In a survey of 123 women who were diagnosed with cancer in one...
November Graft vs Host Disease National SymposiumNovember 1 • Independence, OhioFor more information: www.cowdenfoundation.org/gvhd-home/ Washington State Medical Oncology Society Fall 2013 Oncology ConferenceNovember 1 • Seattle, WashingtonFor more information: www.wsmos.org Quality Care...
CancerCare recently announced the launch of a new edition of A Helping Hand: The Resource Guide for People With Cancer, Financial Edition, a reference guide to assist patients with cancer and their families in navigating the financial resources available to them. A Helping Hand is a comprehensive...
“Once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return.” —Leonardo da Vinci Lung cancer CT screening may have had no greater advocate than Claudia I. Henschke, PhD, MD. In the face of...
This recent paper in The New England Journal of Medicine outlines the details of the clinical outcomes with two incidence screens that were conducted as part of the National Lung Screening Trial (NLST).1 In the wake of the positive review of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) draft...
In the Clinic provides overviews of novel oncology agents, addressing indications, mechanisms, administration recommendations, safety profiles, and other essential information needed for the appropriate clinical use of these drugs. Indication On September 6, paclitaxel protein-bound particles...
Medullary thyroid cancer is derived from parafollicular C cells in the thyroid gland. The disease is sporadic in about 75% of cases and hereditary in the remaining 25%.1 Oncogenic mutations in the gene for tyrosine kinase receptor rearranged during transfection (RET) are driver genetic alterations...
Cancer advocates and clinical trialists, for some time, have been proposing a radical change to the laborious drug development process—that industry, academia, funding sources, and other stakeholders actually pool their brain power and financial means and work together, not separately, to develop...
1. September 30, 2013: Pertuzumab (Perjeta) Accelerated approval in combination with trastuzumab and docetaxel for the neoadjuvant treatment of HER2-positive, locally advanced, inflammatory, or early-stage breast cancer. 2. September 6, 2013: Paclitaxel protein-bound particles (albumin-bound)...
Dubbed “Cancer Czar” by the media, Richard Pazdur, MD, Director of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Office of Hematology and Oncology Products, said he has the “best job in oncology, with a unique vantage point in cancer drug development.” An oncologist for more than 30 years—including...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced class-wide safety labeling changes and new postmarketing study requirements for all extended-release and long-acting opioid analgesics intended to treat pain. “The FDA is invoking its authority to require safety labeling changes and postmarket...
Even as oncologists try to tackle the changing landscape of health care in the United States, many realize that both physicians and patients in this country are still in a better position than those fighting cancer abroad in low- and middle-income countries. In 2009, ASCO joined with Health...
Bone health is critical in patients with multiple myeloma, since up to 85% will suffer bone damage. Options for management include two FDA-approved bisphosphonates—pamidronate and zoledronic acid—and possibly the RANK-L inhibitor denosumab (Xgeva, investigational use). Importance of Supportive ...
In the past, we considered multiple myeloma the poor sibling among lymphoid malignancies. We have seen an amazing amount of change in this field, and Dr. Anderson and colleagues have contributed to that progress. But despite the progress, most patients still relapse,” noted Andrew D. Zelenetz, MD,...
Although upfront therapy can achieve remission in multiple myeloma, most patients will ultimately relapse. Newer targeted therapies and genomic analysis are moving the management of relapsed/refractory multiple myeloma forward, according to Kenneth C. Anderson, MD, Director, Jerome Lipper Multiple...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Cunningham and colleagues and reviewed in this issue of The ASCO Post, the AVEX trial was an open-label randomized phase III trial limited to patients over the age of 70 years with previously untreated, unresectable metastatic colorectal cancer who were not...
At the European Cancer Congress (ECC), Josep Tabernero, MD, PhD, Head of the Medical Oncology Department at Vall d’Hebron University in Barcelona, Spain, noted that the ASPECCT study asks a “reasonable question about the efficacy and safety of the two clinically approved anti-EGFR antibodies” and...
Alberto Sobrero, MD, who discussed the VICTOR trial at the European Cancer Congress, said that at this point, adjuvant trials may be unethical, if the findings of multiple observational studies are to be trusted. Apparently, Dr. Sobrero is a believer: He introduced his remarks at the ECC session by ...
At the 2013 European Cancer Congress, two investigative teams attempted to explain how aspirin may protect against colorectal cancer recurrences, with one study showing PIK3CA mutations associated with protection from aspirin, but not a COX-2 inhibitor, and the other study implicating HLA class I...
The Co-Directors of the 2013 CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, which will be held December 10–14, 2013, have highlighted what they consider to be the most important abstracts to be presented at the Symposium. In a telebriefing in advance of the December meeting, C. Kent Osborne, MD,...
The good news about HER2-positive breast cancer is that recurrent disease is plummeting, owing to the impact of adjuvant trastuzumab [Herceptin]. Hopefully, first-line metastatic treatment is becoming a thing of the past,” said Harold Burstein, MD, PhD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston....
The primacy of science and the overwhelming belief in medical research by the American people has sustained the research community and improved quality of life roughly since the turn of the 20th century. Almost without exception, the American people have voted for politicians who promise improved...
We are just 7 months into the $1 trillion in automatic federal budget spending cuts known as sequestration, and the impact on scientists in all areas of research is already so great, some say its full effects may be irreversible. The ASCO Post recently interviewed ASCO President Clifford A. Hudis, ...
Is more care better care? It is often said, by Americans, that the United States has the best care in the world. However, there are many population-based statistics that do not support that humble opinion. We certainly spend more money than any other nation by far. In fact, we may spend more money ...
ASCO recognizes the importance of evidence-based cancer care and making wise choices in the diagnosis and management of patients with cancer. After careful consideration by experienced oncologists, ASCO annually highlights five categories of tests, procedures and/or treatments annually whose common ...
The impact of hormone replacement therapy on breast cancer risk varies according to the patient’s to race/ethnicity, body mass index, and breast density. An analysis of 1,642,824 screening mammograms with 9,300 breast cancer cases in postmenopausal women aged 45 years or older found that hormone...
“Varying risk factor associations between inflammatory and noninflammatory breast cancer suggest a distinct etiology for [inflammatory] breast cancer,” according to a study in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. High body mass index was shown to increase risk of inflammatory breast cancer ...
For those patients with cancer who may be single, widowed, separated, or divorced, those for whom a natural social support system may be weak, the role of the cancer support group should not be overlooked. In leading a previous trial of supportive-expressive group therapy as a key pathway to foster ...
A clear and consistent protective effect of marriage among patients harboring one of the 10 most clinically significant malignancies affecting Americans” was found in a study analyzing Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEE) data for 734,889 patients diagnosed with lung, colorectal,...
CancerCare recently announced the launch of a new edition of A Helping Hand: The Resource Guide for People With Cancer, Financial Edition, a reference guide to assist patients with cancer and their families in navigating the financial resources available to them. A Helping Hand is a comprehensive...
Common Name: Polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) Brand Names: Omegaven, Max-EPA The use of dietary supplements by patients with cancer has increased significantly over the past 2 decades despite insufficient evidence of safety and effectiveness. Finding reliable sources of information about...
At a forum convened by Friends of Cancer Research in September 2013, a panel of experts presented five proposals outlining how sponsors and FDA may be able to improve and expedite the process for the codevelopment and review of a companion diagnostic designed for use with a drug that has received...
A companion diagnostic developed for use with a drug that has received Breakthrough Therapy designation from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) should automatically be eligible for priority review, according to an expert panel that presented this proposal and four others to the FDA in...
The second largest state in the nation (after Alaska), Texas covers a total area of 268,581 square miles and has a diverse population of over 26 million people. In 1987, the Texas Society of Medical Oncology, now the Texas Society of Clinical Oncology (TxSCO), was formed to address the oncology...
Impaired sleep quality is a concerning problem for many patients with cancer, and pharmacologic treatments come with many negative effects. Several small studies indicate that yoga improves persistent fatigue, sleep disturbance, anxiety, and quality of life, in addition to reducing the need for...
It is estimated that 30% to 90% of patients with cancer experience impairment of sleep quality post-treatment, and such impairment can be severe enough to increase morbidity and mortality. Preliminary evidence indicates that yoga may improve sleep in cancer patients. In a study reported in the...
November Academy of Oncology Nurse Navigators 4th Annual Navigation and Survivorship Conference November 14-17 • Memphis, Tennessee For more information: aonnonline.org/conference Iowa Oncology Society Fall Membership ConferenceNovember 15 • West Des Moines, IowaFor more information:...
In a study reported in Clinical Cancer Research, Zhang and colleagues used integrated metabolomics and transcriptomics to investigate gene-metabolic networks and identify metabolic pathways that are perturbed in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma. A global metabolite profiling analysis was performed ...
The worldwide data from prospective studies of the relationship between levels of endogenous sex hormones and breast cancer risk in postmenopausal women show multiple and complex relationships.1 Nine prospective studies (different from those reported here) of women not taking exogenous sex hormones ...
As reviewed in this issue of The ASCO Post, Sahgal et al reported a multi-institutional analysis aimed at clarifying the risk of developing either new or progressive vertebral body compression fractures following high-dose spinal stereotactic body radiation therapy. In the period studied, they...