In 1995, Matthew Zachary, an aspiring concert pianist and composer, was en route to graduate school to study film composition when he lost all fine-motor coordination in his left hand, was diagnosed with pediatric brain cancer (medulloblastoma), told he would never play again, and was given 6...
Endocrine therapy for breast cancer has evolved over the years. Initial endocrine therapies consisted of ablative procedures (oophorectomy, adrenalectomy, and hypophysectomy). With the availability of pharmaceutical estrogens, progestins, and androgens, ablative procedure utilization begin to...
In a retrospective cohort study, Adeboyeje et al found that a utilization management tool that makes real-time care recommendations can help reduce overuse of substances that assist the bone marrow in producing blood cells, called colony-stimulating factors, in attempts to prevent fevers in...
In a study reported at the 2017 Quality Care Symposium by Zheng et al (Abstract 3) and published in the Journal of Oncology Practice by Jackman et al, researchers explored the use of clinical pathways to support clinical decision-making and manage resources for patients with late-stage...
The majority of children with cancer are treated with complicated chemotherapy regimens that include multiple drugs, demanding monitoring schedules and complex dosing based on body surface area that often require changes in dose. Given this high risk for error in treating children with these highly ...
Brian Weiss, MD, of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, discusses a program designed to eliminate errors in chemotherapy use among pediatric patients whose regimens incorporate multiple drugs and rigorous monitoring schedules (Abstract 37).
Thomas J. Smith, MD, of the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins, summarizes two papers for which he was a discussant: reducing overuse of colony-stimulating factors without compromising the safety of patients with lung cancer receiving chemotherapy, and a cost-and-survival...
Gabrielle Rocque, MD, of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, discusses the challenges of implementing Oncology Care Model requirements, such as providing treatment plans, and the opportunities to transform practices with improved workflow and patient outcomes.
Gwendolyn P. Quinn, PhD, of Moffitt Cancer Center, discusses the challenges that minority, LGBTQ, low-literacy, and underserved populations face in getting their voices heard and what it will take to change that.
Julie Bryar Porter, MS, of Stanford Health Care, discusses an approach to improving patient care with physician-led quality measures from diagnosis through end of life implemented at her academic cancer center (Abstract 49).
Blase N. Polite, MD, MPP, of the University of Chicago, discusses implementing the Oncology Care Model in an academic health center and the challenges of getting buy-in from faculty members.
Laura E. Panattoni, PhD, of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, discusses results from a regional study on emergency department costs during cancer treatment and the need to focus on managing symptoms (Abstract 2).
Nicole Mittmann, PhD, of the Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, discusses her study findings on transitioning breast cancer survivors to primary care and the savings in resources and dollars that accrued as a result (Abstract 1).
Robert S. Miller, MD, of ASCO, updates the progress of CancerLinQ and its data set, now being used by oncologists to track quality measurement and reporting.
Greg D. Judy, MD, of UNC Health Care, discusses the contributing factors, and possible fixes, for near-miss and actual safety incidents in patients being treated with radiotherapy.
Diana D. Jeffery, PhD, of the Defense Health Agency, discusses the need to screen for mental health comorbidities, including depression, anxiety, adjustment disorders, substance use disorders, and persistent mental illnesses, as shown in a study of breast and prostate cancer patients (Abstract 18).
Caleb Dulaney, MD, of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, discusses ways to broaden and improve the quality of information that women with breast cancer find—in English and Spanish—on websites of nationally recognized cancer centers (Abstract 135).
John V. Cox, DO, MBA, of the Parkland Health System/UTSW, discusses some of the key presentations at the 2017 Quality Care Symposium (Abstracts 3, 37, 52).
Ethan M. Basch, MD, of The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, discusses programs—now rolling out at various institutions—that use direct patient reporting of symptoms as a part of quality assessment (Posters 61, 81; Abstract 218).
Exercise and/or psychological therapy may work better than medications to reduce cancer-related fatigue and should be recommended first to patients, according to a Wilmot Cancer Institute-led study published by Mustian et al in JAMA Oncology. “If a [patient with cancer] is having trouble...
Genentech, the Breast International Group, the Breast European Adjuvant Study Team, and the Frontier Science Foundation have announced positive results from the phase III APHINITY study. The study met its primary endpoint and showed that adjuvant treatment with the...
Results from a new prospective clinical trial indicate that high–dose rate (HDR) brachytherapy administered in a single 19-Gy treatment may be a safe and effective alternative to longer courses of HDR treatment for men with localized prostate cancer. The study was reported by Krauss et al in...
Adding two blood-borne proteins associated with cancer cell migration increases the predictive ability of the current biomarker for pancreatic cancer to detect early-stage disease, a research team from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center reported in a study by Balasenthil et al in the ...
Holger N. Lode, MD, of the University of Greifswald, discusses in German the survival of neuroblastoma patients treated with long-term infusion of the anti-GD2 antibody ch14.18/CHO and killer-cell Ig-like receptor genotypes and Fc-receptor polymorphisms. (Abstract 111)
On February 28, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved telotristat ethyl (Xermelo) tablets in combination with somatostatin analog therapy for the treatment of adults with carcinoid syndrome diarrhea that somatostatin analog therapy alone has inadequately controlled. About...
A new study led by American Cancer Society investigators found that cancer survivors are more likely to change their prescription drug use for financial reasons than those without a cancer history. These findings were published by Zheng et al in Cancer. The rising cost of cancer drugs imposes a...
A new analysis of data from the U.S. Military Health System found that mood and adjustment disorders such as anxiety and depression were strong predictors of the annual number of outpatient visits, hospital admissions, and number of days in the hospital for patients with breast and prostate...
As an increasing number of patients look to the internet for cancer information, researchers from the University of Alabama found that the websites of many National Cancer Institute (NCI)-designated cancer centers lack sufficient information to help patients with breast cancer understand all their...
An influx of new oral cancer drugs provides patients with a more convenient and less invasive way to take medication, but such treatments are often associated with adherence challenges and medical errors. New research shows that the addition of an in-house specialty pharmacy at a cancer center in...
Shridar Ganesan, MD, PhD, of the Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey, discusses mutation burden as a biomarker of response to immune checkpoint therapy in nine solid cancers.
Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, of the Yale Cancer Center, discusses immunotherapy as a standard of care in lung cancer, critical biomarkers, and scientifically guided combination treatment, which will be the future of lung cancer immunotherapy.
Prasad S. Adusumilli, MD, of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, discusses a way to promote functional persistence of CAR T cells as an ideal strategy for solid tumor immunotherapy.
Marie-Andrée Forget, PhD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses study findings on the impact of checkpoint blockade prior to adoptive cell therapy using tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes for metastatic melanoma. (Abstract 138)
Limo Chen, PhD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses co-inhibition of CD38 and PD-L1, which leads to improved antitumor immune response, reducing tumor growth and metastasis. (Abstract 79)
Lawrence Fong, MD, of the University of California, San Francisco, discusses combination immunotherapy, now approved in melanoma, and the trials underway to explore other indications.
Howard Kaufman, MD, of Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey, discusses a subgroup analysis of efficacy results on avelumab in chemotherapy-refractory metastatic Merkel cell carcinoma. (Abstract 80)
Holger N. Lode, MD, of the University of Greifswald, discusses the survival of neuroblastoma patients treated with long-term infusion of the anti-GD2 antibody ch14.18/CHO and killer-cell Ig-like receptor genotypes and Fc-receptor polymorphisms. (Abstract 111)
Elizabeth Ann Mittendorf, MD, PhD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses some of the top papers presented at the ASCO-SITC Symposium and how these presentations will affect clinical practice.
Stephen Gottschalk, MD, of Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Children’s Hospital, discusses combining CAR T cells with checkpoint blockade or targeted treatments to improve their antitumor activity in solid tumors.
People with rare cancers now have the option of joining a national clinical trial testing leading-edge immunotherapies for a wide variety of tumor types. It’s the first federally funded immunotherapy trial devoted to rare cancers. Despite their name, rare cancers make up more than 20% of cancers...
Stephen K. Carter, MD, a renowned oncologist who held a variety of executive positions in the pharmaceutical industry and played a major role in the research and development of many widely used cancer and AIDS drugs, died on November 14, 2016, after a long battle against multiple systems atrophy....
MARCH 2017 ASCO Oncology Practice ConferenceMarch 2 • Orlando, FloridaFor more information: www.asco.org/meetings/symposia-conferences/asco-oncology-practice-conference 23rd Annual Blood-Brain Barrier Consortium Meeting March 2-4 • Stevenson, WashingtonFor more information:...
In a meta-analysis reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Jackson et al found that overall survival with sorafenib (Nexavar) in advanced hepatocellular carcinoma was significantly improved vs comparator treatments among patients who were both hepatitis B virus (HBV)-negative and hepatitis C...
In a phase I study reported in The Lancet Oncology, Charles M. Rudin, MD, of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, and colleagues found that rovalpituzumab tesirine, a first-in-class antibody-drug conjugate directed against delta-like protein 3 (DLL3), produced responses in patients with...
Translational research in pancreatic adenocarcinoma has been limited by the difficulty of obtaining sufficient quality and quantity tumor tissue from patients. A study by Pietrasz et al assessing the feasibility and prognostic value of circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) in pancreatic adenocarcinoma has...
Kathleen N. Moore, MD, of Stephenson Cancer Center, The University of Oklahoma, and colleagues found that mirvetuximab soravtansine (also known as IMGN853)—an antibody-drug conjugate targeting folate receptor alpha (FRα)—is active in FRα-positive platinum-resistant ovarian cancer, according to a...
In part 1 of the phase II ARIEL2 trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Elizabeth M. Swisher, MD, of the University of Washington, and colleagues found that the poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor rucaparib was associated with prolonged progression-free survival among patients with...
In an analysis of outcomes in the North Central Cancer Treatment Group/Alliance N9831 trial reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Edith A. Perez, MD, of the Mayo Clinic Cancer Center, and colleagues found that patients with tumors scored as HER2-enriched or luminal subtype...
Columbia University Medical Center, NewYork-Presbyterian, and the Life Raft Group, a patient advocacy organization specializing in advanced gastrointestinal stromal tumors (GIST), announced that they have entered into a collaborative research project to investigate the efficacy of a novel system...
“The big thing that is going to become more and more of an issue, and that you are going to hear a lot more of this year, and in the next several years, is overdiagnosis,” Otis W. Brawley, MD, FACP, Chief Medical Officer of the American Cancer Society, told The ASCO Post in an interview following...