A novel approach using a drug called MK-6482 showed activity in a phase I/II study in patients with metastatic clear cell renal cell carcinoma, according to a presentation at the 2020 Genitourinary Cancers Symposium.1 MK-6482 is an oral, first-in-class selective small-molecule inhibitor that...
A study published in JAMA Oncology found that 31 genome-targeted anticancer agents were in use as of January 2018.1 To shed light on the current state of precision oncology, The ASCO Post recently spoke with David M. Cutler, PhD, the Otto Eckstein Professor of Applied Economics in the Department of ...
Martine J. Piccart, MD, PhD, FASCO, reported that at 6-year follow-up of the APHINITY trial there was a modest, but not statistically significant, overall survival benefit for the addition of pertuzumab to chemotherapy plus trastuzumab vs chemotherapy/trastuzumab as adjuvant therapy in patients...
Daniel V.T. Catenacci, MD, Associate Professor of Medicine and Director of the Gastrointestinal Oncology Program at the University of Chicago, was the JAVELIN Gastric 100 study’s invited discussant. After offering an extensive background on the use of immunotherapy in gastric or gastroesophageal...
As the number of solid organ transplants in the United States rises, cancer in this patient population is a growing concern. In fact, solid organ transplant recipients have an up to 50 times greater risk than the general population of developing skin cancers, and for kidney transplant recipients,...
Monthly giving is an efficient and effective way to help conquer cancer every month of the year. Monthly gifts to Conquer Cancer, the ASCO Foundation, are processed automatically, which helps reduce costs and allows your donation to have the greatest possible impact in funding the research...
ASCO submitted its Patient-Centered Oncology Payment (PCOP) model for consideration by the Physician-Focused Payment Model Technical Advisory Committee (PTAC). PTAC is an advisory group to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), which sends recommendations to the Secretary of HHS on...
Beginning this year, oncology specialists will have the opportunity to pursue a more flexible and less burdensome path to maintaining recertification. The American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM)/ASCO Medical Oncology: Learning & Assessment (MOLA) is a lower-stakes Maintenance of...
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute will establish the Riney Family Multiple Myeloma Initiative to help improve outcomes and accelerate understanding of the underlying biology for the most challenging types of myeloma. The initiative is being established with a $16.5 million gift from Paula and Rodger...
George A. Fisher, Jr, MD, PhD, the Colleen Haas Chair in Medicine-Oncology at Stanford University School of Medicine, commented on the cell-free DNA methylation blood-based test from the Circulating Cell-Free Genome Atlas (CCGA) study. The findings presented by Dr. Wolpin, he said, “lead us to the ...
Studies have shown that all patients diagnosed with multiple myeloma had a preceding asymptomatic expansion of clonal plasma cells, clinically recognized as monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance or smoldering multiple myeloma. According to C. Ola Landgren, MD, PhD, Professor of...
ASCO recently endorsed the Cancer Care Ontario (CCO) guideline “Bone Health and Bone-Targeted Therapies for Prostate Cancer,” which was originally approved by CCO in 2017.1 The recommendations were based on a systematic review and meta-analysis of relevant research and clinical trial reports...
Using antioxidants and other dietary supplements before and during adjuvant chemotherapy for breast cancer may increase the risk of recurrence and “to a lesser extent, death,” according to an analysis of dietary and nutritional data from a phase III trial, published in the Journal of Clinical...
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,...
Patients with BRAF-mutated metastatic colorectal cancer “pose clinical challenges for us every day,” said Christopher M. Booth, MD, Professor of Medical Oncology and the Canada Research Chair in Population Cancer Care at Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, the invited discussant of the...
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...
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...
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...
A novel, first-in-class, small molecule, hypoxia-inducible factor 2 alpha (HIF2A) inhibitor showed single-agent activity in heavily pretreated patients with metastatic clear cell renal cell carcinoma. These results from a phase I/II study will be presented by Toni Choueiri, MD, and colleagues at...
A personalized approach to selecting antibody therapy for patients with newly diagnosed stage IV gastroesophageal adenocarcinoma resulted in a 1-year overall survival rate of 66% and a median overall survival of 16.4 months in the PANGEA study (see Table 1).1 The study used a novel clinical...
Monthly giving is an efficient and effective way to help conquer cancer all year long. Monthly gifts to Conquer Cancer, the ASCO Foundation®, are processed automatically, which helps reduce costs and allows your donation to have the greatest possible impact in funding the research advancing the...
In the release of its annual report on progress against cancer, Clinical Cancer Advances 2020, ASCO recognized progress in the refinement of the surgical treatment of cancer as the Advance of the Year. In particular, the emergence of novel systemic therapies—combined in new and better ways—has...
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), approximately 70% of deaths from cancer occur in low- and middle-income countries, where late-stage presentation and inaccessibility to diagnosis and treatment are common.1 In the sub-Saharan African country of Ethiopia, cancer is becoming an...
A new study on hematopoietic stem cell transplantation from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis suggests that extremely rare, harmful genetic mutations present in healthy donors’ stem cells—though not causing health problems in the donors—may be passed on to patients with cancer...
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,...
In my 45 years of practicing hematology/oncology at a major urban academic medical center, I have observed a sea change in daily practice that contributes to physician burnout. Although the emotional stresses of caring for seriously ill people play a part in physician burnout, I find the daily...
The history of medicine once was featured in medical school curricula. That is becoming less common due to time restriction and the increased prevalence of more technical topics. However, the importance of the history of medicine cannot be overstated: It shapes every aspect of our cultural,...
In the release of its annual report on progress against cancer, Clinical Cancer Advances 2020, ASCO recognized progress in the refinement of the surgical treatment of cancer as the Advance of the Year. In particular, the emergence of novel systemic therapies—combined in new and better ways—has...
A simple test using a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan may be used to predict how well people with advanced epithelial ovarian cancer will respond to treatment, according to the results of a new study published by Winfield et al in Radiology. In a large clinical trial, scientists have shown a...
Today’s World Cancer Day, led by the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC), aims to mobilize urgent action from individuals, governments, and the global cancer community to close gaps in cancer risk awareness between higher and lower socioeconomic groups and the subsequent impact on their...
Unlike ASCO’s Annual Meeting, symposia, and conferences, which highlight the current scientific advances in specific cancers and how they are improving cancer outcomes for the more than 18.1 million people worldwide diagnosed with cancer each year,1 ASCO Breakthrough: A Global Summit for Oncology...
In the first comparative clinical trial of lung cancer screening decision aid vs standard educational information, researchers from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center showed that a decision aid delivered through tobacco quitlines effectively reaches a screening-eligible population...
In 2017, breast cancer expert Gabrielle Rocque, MD, MSPH, received an American Cancer Society Mentored Research Scholar Grant for her work in enhancing shared decision-making for patients with advanced breast cancer. “I come from three generations of physicians,” shared Dr. Rocque. “My father (Dr. ...
Some patients with cancer celebrate the end of a course of radiation or chemotherapy by ringing a bell. Indeed, many patients say they love the graduation-like ceremony and the sense of closure it gives them. However, a study published by Williams et al in the International Journal of Radiation...
Residents of rural, sparsely populated “frontier counties” in the western United States have a higher incidence of skin cancer and related mortality rates. New research published by Jensen et al in Psychology, Health & Medicine indicated that the biggest obstacle to early detection and...
Six-year follow-up of the APHINITY trial found a modest, but not statistically significant, overall survival benefit for the addition of pertuzumab to chemotherapy plus trastuzumab vs chemotherapy/trastuzumab as adjuvant therapy in patients with early HER2-positive breast cancer. The benefit was...
For several breast cancer experts interviewed by The ASCO Post, the phase III oral paclitaxel study and the drug itself had some limitations. Virginia Kaklamani, MD, of UT Health San Antonio, moderator of a press briefing, thought that the dosing process and the 11 pills or so per day was a...
Despite millennia of anatomic and biomedical search and discovery, there are parts and functions of the human body that remain a mystery. For years, medical students were taught that there are 78 organs in the human body. In February 2017, that number was revised, with the announcement of a new...
The role of caregiver in the cancer scenario is complicated by various emotions and circumstances beyond the control of the caregiver and the person with cancer. Caregiver stress occurs when there isn’t the time to do all that’s asked or expected of one. Caregiver stress evolves into burnout when...
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 day after Christmas, I walked into the exercise studio and spent the next hour jogging, rowing, and doing exactly what that morning’s coach instructed the 20 or so participants of the class to do next. The hour passed quickly, and I had little or no time to think about anything other than the...
ASCO released a major update to its Patient-Centered Oncology Payment (PCOP) model, an alternative payment model designed to support transformation in cancer care delivery and reimbursement, while ensuring that patients with cancer have access to high-quality, high-value care. PCOP addresses an...
Value-based care in oncology—a concept that emphasizes quality over quantity—has evolved over the past 2 decades to become a guiding principle of both public and private payers. The concept was part of the Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act (MIPPA) of 2008; informed elements of...
Hope S. Rugo, MD, FASCO, Professor of Medicine, Director of Breast Oncology and Clinical Trials at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center, said the residual cancer burden index is being increasingly used in medical oncology. “The...
Residual cancer burden after neoadjuvant chemotherapy can accurately predict disease recurrence and survival across all breast cancer subtypes, according to the findings from a meta-analysis presented at the 2019 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium by W. Fraser Symmans, MD, Professor and Director...
The combination of brentuximab vedotin and nivolumab is making headway as first-line therapy for older adults with Hodgkin lymphoma and as salvage therapy for adults with relapsed or refractory classic Hodgkin lymphoma, according to separate studies presented at the 2019 Annual Meeting &...
The likelihood of a patient responding to immune checkpoint blockade may depend on B cells in the tumor, located within specialized immune-cell clusters known as tertiary lymphoid structures, according to three studies all recently published in Nature. The studies showed that enrichment of B cells...
This week, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted Priority Review to treatments for ovarian, prostate, and lung cancer; granted Orphan Drug designation to therapies for chemotherapy-induced thrombocytopenia and multiple myeloma; and granted Breakthrough Device designation to platforms...
With the pediatric cancer survival rate exceeding 80%, “we can reasonably suspect that most of these children will survive more than 5 years from their diagnosis and then go on to puberty,” when they may have to deal with the consequences of cancer treatment, according to Rebecca Flyckt, MD,...