Anti–PD-1 antibodies have been shown to be effective in solid tumors. There is evidence that the malignant Reed-Sternberg cells in Hodgkin lymphomas use the PD-1 pathway to evade immune detection, with alterations in chromosome 9p24.1 increasing levels of PD-L1 and PD-L2 and promoting...
Next-generation sequencing in malignant pleural mesothelioma tumors shows a complex mutational setting with a high number of genetic alterations in genes involved in DNA repair, cell survival, and cell proliferation pathways, according to a study by Lo Iacono et al in the Journal of Thoracic...
In a phase III PROFILE 1014 trial reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Solomon et al found that the ALK inhibitor crizotinib (Xalkori) improved progression-free survival vs standard chemotherapy in first-line treatment of advanced ALK-positive non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC)....
A new study led by researchers at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James) describes a novel marker that might help doctors choose the least toxic, most effective treatment for many...
In a study of patients with nonsquamous non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), the addition of ramucirumab (Cyramza) to pemetrexed (Alimta) and platinum chemotherapy did not significantly improve progression-free survival, according to a study by Doebele et al in Cancer. However, the...
In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Kurta et al calculated conditional disease-free survival estimates among ovarian cancer patients, showing that odds of remaining disease free improve with a longer disease-free period from initial remission. Improved Conditional Disease-Free ...
In a study reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Di Narzo et al found that individual colon cancer gene-expression risk scores contributed little to the prognostic ability of traditional risk factors. Study Details The study involved evaluation of four gene-expression risk...
In the phase III EORTC 30994 trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Sternberg et al found no overall survival difference between immediate and delayed adjuvant chemotherapy after radical cystectomy in patients with muscle-invasive urothelial carcinoma of the bladder. Immediate treatment was...
In a study reported in JAMA, Bekelman et al found that approximately two-thirds of patients with early-stage breast cancer for whom hypofractionated whole-breast irradiation is endorsed receive conventional whole-breast irradiation after breast-conserving surgery. Health-care expenditures were...
The addition of everolimus to weekly trastuzumab (Herceptin) plus paclitaxel did not improve outcomes in the phase III BOLERO-1/TRIO-019, but did provide a “signal” in the hormone receptor–negative subset. The study was reported at the 2014 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium by...
Among early-stage breast cancer patients who reduced their dietary fat intake for 5 years following a diagnosis, after over 15 years follow-up, death rates from all causes were significantly reduced in those who had hormone-unrelated breast cancer, according to data from the Women’s...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) today approved ramucirumab (Cyramza) for use in combination with docetaxel for the treatment of patients with metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with disease progression on or after platinum-based chemotherapy. Patients with EGFR or ALK...
In a study reported in Journal of Clinical Oncology, Couch et al found a high frequency of inherited mutations in breast cancer susceptibility genes in a cohort of women with triple-negative breast cancer unselected for family history of breast or ovarian cancer. In the study, the frequency of...
In elderly breast cancer patients with moderate- to high-risk early-stage disease for whom standard chemotherapy is too toxic, capecitabine, which causes fewer side effects than standard chemotherapy agents, did not improve outcomes when tested as monotherapy, according to data from the phase III...
In a randomized phase II trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Motzer et al found that the PD-1 immune checkpoint inhibitor antibody nivolumab was associated with antitumor activity and manageable toxicity at three dose levels in patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma who had...
Single-agent treatment with the immunotherapy drug pembrolizumab (Keytruda) produced a “signal of activity” and led to some durable response, in patients with metastatic triple-negative breast cancer, Rita Nanda, MD, of the University of Chicago, reported at the 2014 San Antonio Breast...
Interest is high in studying the PI3K pathway in hormone receptor–positive breast cancer, but it is not clear which of the PI3K inhibitors under development—if any—will be a “home run.” Adding the pan-class I selective PI3K inhibitor pictilisib to fulvestrant...
In a phase II study, the histone deacetylase inhibitor pracinostat demonstrated significant clinical activity in combination with azacitadine in elderly patients with newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Interim data from 33 evaluable patients were presented at the 56th American Society of ...
As reported in a letter to Nature by Powles et al, the anti–PD ligand-1 (PD-L1) antibody MPDL3280A has shown good activity in patients with metastatic urothelial bladder cancer in a phase I study. Outcomes were best in patients with PD-L1 immunohistochemistry (IHC) expression of 2 or 3 in...
Although small cell lung cancer is an aggressive disease with a high mortality rate, in contrast to other lung carcinomas, there has not been significant progress in the development of therapies for the disease in more than 3 decades. Now, researchers using a high-throughput cellular screen of a...
According to new data reported at the 56th American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting and Exposition, ibrutinib (Imbruvica) demonstrated antitumor activity both as a single agent and in combination with dexamethasone in heavily pretreated patients with relapsed or relapsed/refractory...
Results from the international phase II BLAST study show that one cycle of blinatumomab (Blincyto) immunotherapy achieved complete minimal residual disease response in 78% of patients with precursor B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). Complete minimal residual disease response was...
The promise of the programmed death receptor-1 (PD-1) inhibitors seen in solid tumors, especially melanoma, may hold true for at least one hematologic malignancy, according to studies presented at the 56th American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting and Exposition. At a press briefing,...
In the phase III GETUG 13 trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Fizazi et al found that treatment intensification based on early tumor marker decline resulted in a numeric and borderline statistically significant improvement in progression-free survival in patients with poor-prognosis germ cell...
In a study reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Shiels et al found significant changes in levels of inflammatory/immune markers in current cigarette smokers vs nonsmokers. There was a significant relationship between time since quitting and return to nonsmoker levels for...
In a phase II trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Jänne et al found that the pan-HER inhibitor dacomitinib was active in first-line treatment of patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with EGFR mutations or clinical characteristics associated with response to EGFR...
A new study presented at RSNA 2014, the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America, has found that digital breast tomosynthesis, also known as three-dimensional (3D) mammography, has the potential to significantly increase the cancer detection rate in mammography screening of women ...
In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Yuan et al found that pancreas cancer patients with diabetes of more than 4 years’ duration at diagnosis had significantly poorer survival compared with nondiabetic patients. Study Details The study involved data from 1,006 patients...
In a phase II study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Topp et al found that the bispecific T-cell engager (BiTE) antibody blinatumomab produced a high response rate in patients with relapsed or refractory B-precursor acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). BiTEs induce a transient cytolytic ...
In the French phase II AVATAXHER trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Coudert et al found that 18F–fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) positron-emission tomography (PET) predicted complete response to trastuzumab (Herceptin)/docetaxel neoadjuvant therapy and that adding bevacizumab (Avastin) in...
In the phase II SMARTE-R-CHOP-14 trial of the German High-Grade Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma Study Group reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Pfreundschuh et al found that extended rituximab (Rituxan) exposure in patients aged > 60 years with poor-prognosis diffuse large B-cell lymphoma was...
In a retrospective single-institution study reported in JAMA Surgery, Gangi et al found a low risk of breast cancer after diagnosis of ovarian cancer in women harboring BRCA mutations. The study involved 364 women who had BRCA mutation testing for stage I to IV epithelial ovarian...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Nguyen-Tan et al, long-term follow-up in the phase III Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG) 0129 trial indicates no difference in overall survival or late toxicity with use of accelerated vs standard radiation therapy plus cisplatin in patients...
In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Shiels et al found that prediagnostic smoking among survivors of stage I lung cancer or bladder, kidney, or head/neck cancer was associated with increased risk of second lung, bladder, kidney, and head and neck cancer. Study Details The...
In a phase III study reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Robert et al found that the combination of the BRAF inhibitor dabrafenib (Tafinlar) plus the MEK inhibitor trametinib (Mekinist) significantly improved overall survival compared with the BRAF inhibitor vemurafenib (Zelboraf) in...
In a phase III trial reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Wagner et al found that use of two units vs one unit of umbilical cord blood in hematopoietic stem cell transplantation did not improve 1-year overall survival in children and adolescents with hematologic cancers. Use of...
In a phase III trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Pawel et al found no difference in overall survival with amrubicin vs topotecan as second-line therapy in patients with first-line sensitive or refractory small cell lung cancer. An overall survival benefit of amrubicin was observed ...
In a combined analysis of outcomes in the translational research cohort of the Arimidex, Tamoxifen Alone or in Combination trial (TransATAC) and the Austrian Breast and Colorectal Cancer Study Group 8 (ABCSG 8) trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Sestak and colleagues found that the ...
In a phase III trial reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Robert et al found that the PD-1 immune-checkpoint–inhibitor antibody nivolumab significantly increased overall survival, progression-free survival, and objective response rate compared with dacarbazine in patients with...
Researchers have found that patients with an advanced form of kidney cancer, for which there is no standard treatment and a very poor prognosis, respond well to a combination of two existing anticancer drugs. The combination of bevacizumab (Avastin) and erlotinib (Tarceva) produced excellent...
Current guidelines discourage tumor marker assessment in surveillance of nonmetastatic breast cancer. In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Ramsey et al found that > 40% of Medicare patients with early-stage breast cancer had at least one tumor marker assessment and that...
In a phase II study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Ladra et al found that proton radiotherapy was a safe and effective treatment in pediatric rhabdomyosarcoma. Proton radiotherapy can substantially reduce radiotherapy doses to normal tissue compared with conventional photon...
In a substudy of the IBIS-II trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Sestak et al found that risedronate treatment reduced anastrozole-related bone loss over 3 years in postmenopausal women at increased risk for breast cancer. Study Details The study involved assessment of bone mineral density...
In a phase III trial (Southwest Oncology Group Intergroup S0008) reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Flaherty et al found that a shorter course of biochemotherapy consisting of cisplatin, vinblastine, dacarbazine, interleukin-2, and interferon alfa-2b produced better relapse-free...
In a study on use of the most common definitive therapies for non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) in Medicare patients reported in JAMA Surgery, Shirvani et al found that lobectomy was associated with improved outcome vs sublobar resection and that stereotactic ablative radiotherapy may be of...
In a phase III trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, O’Shaughnessy et al found that the addition of iniparib to gemcitabine and carboplatin did not improve overall survival or progression-free survival in patients with metastatic triple-negative breast cancer. An exploratory...
In a phase II study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Iyengar et al found that stereotactic body radiation therapy plus erlotinib (Tarceva) resulted in infrequent recurrence in radiation therapy–treated sites and was associated with prolonged progression-free survival and overall...
Adding interleukin-2 to gefitinib (Iressa) therapy resulted in threefold higher response rates in patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), according to a study by Bersanelli et al in Cancers. The addition of interleukin-2 enhanced the efficacy of gefitinib without negatively ...
In the phase III Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) E-3193 (Intergroup 0142) trial, reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Tevaarwerk et al, adding ovarian function suppression to tamoxifen was associated with worse patient-reported outcomes in premenopausal women with...
In the phase III Cancer and Leukemia Group B (CALGB) 40302/Alliance trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Burstein et al found that the addition of the dual EGFR-HER2 inhibitor lapatinib (Tykerb) to endocrine therapy with fulvestrant (Faslodex) did not improve progression-free...