For patients with multiple myeloma, chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy is gaining ground in pilot studies. At the 2016 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition, researchers presented their latest findings for this innovative therapy, which has proven...
Waldenström’s macroglobulinemia, a rare subtype of non-Hodgkin lymphoma, affects approximately 1,500 to 2,000 people in the United States each year. Although it is not curable, Waldenström’s macroglobulinemia is grow slowly, and in many patients, it is manageable as a chronic disease. To that end,...
The Fox Chase–Temple University Hospital Bone Marrow Transplant Program has received internationally recognized accreditation by the Foundation for the Accreditation of Cellular Therapy (FACT) at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. By demonstrating compliance with the FACT-JACIE...
Sandra J. Horning, MD, Chief Medical Officer and Executive Vice President of Global Development for Roche/Genentech, was named the 2017 recipient of the Duane Roth Memorial Award. The award was presented February 16 at the annual Industry/Academia Translational Oncology Symposium at the University ...
In a rigorous study of tumor tissue collected from 125 patients with aggressive brain cancers, researchers at Johns Hopkins said they have found no evidence of cytomegalovirus (CMV) infection and concluded that a link between the two diseases, as claimed by earlier reports, likely does not exist. A ...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Larissa Nekhlyudov, MD, MPH, of Brigham & Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, and colleagues, ASCO has endorsed the 2016 American Cancer Society (ACS) guideline on head and neck cancer survivorship care. The endorsement was based on ...
Combining immunotherapies with each other or with other agents such as chemotherapy and growth factor inhibitors holds promise for better tapping their benefit in patients with lung cancer, data from several studies suggest. Results show that strategic combinations can achieve higher response...
Allyson J. Ocean, MD, a pancreatic cancer specialist at New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center and Associate Professor of Medicine at the Weill Medical College of Cornell University, commented on these study findings. “While I applaud the authors for the data presented, the...
An older trial designed to evaluate the benefits of adjuvant therapy following radical prostatectomy in patients with high-risk prostate cancer showed no difference in overall or disease-free survival between 2 years of androgen-deprivation therapy and 2 years of androgen-deprivation therapy plus...
Human papillomavirus (HPV) is the most common sexually transmitted infection worldwide. It affects 80% of individuals, with the initial infection usually occurring between the ages of 15 and 24. Persistent infection with oncogenic HPV genotypes, primarily 16 and 18, is the cause of virtually all...
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...