For some early-stage breast cancer patients, accelerated partial-breast irradiation using multicatheter brachytherapy following breast-conserving surgery may be an excellent treatment option, as it has now been proven to be as effective as the current standard treatment—whole-breast...
The steroid dexamethasone reduces radiation-induced pain flare in cancer patients with painful bone metastases, according to research presented by Chow et al (Abstract LBA1) October 18, 2015 at the American Society for Radiation Oncology’s (ASTRO’s) 57th Annual Meeting in San Antonio,...
For some patients with human papillomavirus (HPV)-related cancer of the tonsils and tongue, reduced-intensity radiation therapy and chemotherapy may be as effective as standard-dose radiation and chemotherapy, and result in fewer acute side effects, according to research presented by Chera et al...
Immunotherapy combined with palliative radiation therapy for a subset of patients with metastatic melanoma reduces the growth and spread of the cancer, according to research presented by Hiniker et al (Abstract 215) on October 20, 2015 at the American Society for Radiation Oncology’s...
Researchers at King's College London have investigated a new method that could be used by general practitioners to quickly determine the number of moles on the entire body by counting the number found on a smaller “proxy” body area, such as an arm. These findings were published by...
Pfizer announced that the investigational antibody-drug conjugate inotuzumab ozogamicin received Breakthrough Therapy designation from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). The Breakthrough Therapy designation was based on the results of the phase III...
Researchers have discovered details of the abnormal molecular signals and biologic events that drive a high-risk form of the childhood cancer neuroblastoma. They aim to use these findings to develop more effective targeted treatments. “As we improve our knowledge of different biologic...
A study led by Johns Hopkins researchers has linked the immunosuppressive drug mycophenolate mofetil to an increased risk of central nervous system lymphoma in solid organ transplant patients. But the same study also found that another class of immunosuppressive drugs, calcineurin inhibitors, given ...
Among children with intermediate-risk rhabdomyosarcoma that is negative for a fusion gene, those who had a high score for expression of a specific gene signature called MG5 had poorer survival outcomes compared with those who had a low MG5 score, according to a study published by Hingorani et al in ...
Cancer is the result of normal cellular functions going wildly awry on a genetic level. That fact has been known for some time, but increasing evidence is showing that the human microbiome, the diverse population of microorganisms within every person, may play a key role in either setting the stage ...
As reported by Falini et al in a letter to The New England Journal of Medicine, dactinomycin treatment resulted in morphologic and molecular complete remission ongoing at 14 months in a patient with NPM1-mutant acute myeloid leukemia (AML). NPM1-mutated AML may account for one-third of AML in...
Badly designed studies may lead to the efficacy of drugs being overestimated and money being wasted on trials that prove fruitless, according to new a study from McGill University in Montreal. The findings, published by Henderson et al in eLife, highlight the importance of ensuring that other...
Accelerated partial-breast irradiation was designed to be a faster, more convenient, and potentially safer way for many women with breast cancer to reduce their mortality risk and help keep their cancer from returning after surgery. But a new study shows that despite the availability of accelerated ...
Fresh research at Sahlgrenska Academy has found that antioxidants can double the rate of melanoma metastasis in mice. The results reinforce previous findings that antioxidants hasten the progression of lung cancer. According to Martin Bergö, PhD, people with cancer or an elevated risk of...
In a letter to The New England Journal of Medicine, Ransohoff et al describe genetic evidence of phenotype switching from basal cell to squamous cell carcinoma in a patient receiving vismodegib (Erivedge) for basal cell carcinoma. Hedgehog signaling pathway activation, a central feature of...
Results of the phase III AHT trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Eeles et al suggest that adjuvant hormonal therapy may improve survival in women with epithelial ovarian cancer. The trial, started in 1990, was stopped early due to low recruitment. Study Details In the open-label ...
Bone marrow transplantation is a lifesaving therapy for many patients with blood cancers like leukemias and lymphomas. Currently, the gold standard blood-generating stem cells are obtained from a donor, most likely a sibling, with a perfect match to the patient in order to minimize the chance of...
For a malignant tumor to form, cancer cells must evade the immune system's attack. Numerous studies have already shown that cancer spreads particularly aggressively if there is an unfavorable balance between suppressing and active immune cells in the tumor microenvironment. “But we didn't...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) today approved nivolumab (Opdivo) to treat patients with metastatic nonsquamous non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) whose disease progressed during or after platinum-based chemotherapy. Nivolumab is a monoclonal antibody that that blocks the...
Surgical removal of melanoma that has metastasized to the abdomen appears to help patients live more than twice as long as those who receive only medical therapy, according to study results presented at the 2015 Clinical Congress of the American College of Surgeons. In more than 1,600 patients...
As time lapses, many patients who have undergone a colonoscopy become less and less likely to recall when and where they last had the procedure performed, who the doctor was who performed it, whether polyps were found, and, if so, the number and size of those polyps, according to new study results...
Surviving neuroblastoma as a child can come with just as many challenges as the cancer itself, mainly because of the toxic effects of chemotherapy. But a team of surgeons is in the nascent stages of developing a more targeted, less toxic method of treating neuroblastoma patients with chemotherapy....
An innovative service model that partners radiation oncology with palliative care leads to better results for patients, according to a new analysis. The model of care, established at Mount Sinai Medical Center, is one of only a handful in the country. The study (Abstract 110) will be presented at...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) today approved an expanded indication for the Optune tumor treating fields device to treat patients with newly diagnosed glioblastoma multiforme. It is given along with the chemotherapy drug temozolomide following standard treatments that include...
Disparities in outcomes for children with retinoblastoma suggest unequal access to primary care, researchers from Dana-Farber/Boston Children's Cancer and Blood Disorders Center reported in a study published by Truong et al in JAMA Pediatrics. Although virtually all the children in the study...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, ASCO has endorsed the current American College of Chest Physicians (CHEST) guideline on treatment of small cell lung cancer, released in 2013. After review of evidence from an updated literature search covering 2011 to March 2015, an ASCO...
Almost half of patients with advanced lung cancer receive more than the recommended number of radiation treatments to reduce their pain, according to a new study published by Koshy et al in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Radiation therapy that is palliative can reduce the pain from...
A study evaluating the effects of bariatric surgery on obese women most at risk for cancer has found that the weight-loss surgery slashed participants' weight by one-third and eliminated precancerous uterine growths in those who had them. Other effects included improving patients' physical quality...
On October 2, 2015, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted accelerated approval for pembrolizumab (Keytruda) to treat patients with metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) whose disease has progressed after other treatments and with tumors that express programmed cell...
The latest results from a trial of a combination of two targeted therapies (dabrafenib [Tafinlar] and trametinib [Mekinist]) to treat advanced melanoma have shown that patients are living significantly longer on the combined therapy than patients treated with vemurafenib (Zelboraf) alone. Caroline...
Gastric cancer is typically associated with late-stage diagnosis, as well as high mortality. A study by Li et al in The American Journal of Pathology points to a pivotal role played by the biomarker microRNA (miR)-506 in gastric cancer. Patients whose primary gastric cancer lesions express high...
An international team of researchers has shown that the use of the mTOR inhibitor everolimus can delay tumor growth among both gastrointestinal and lung neuroendocrine tumors. This is particularly important for patients with lung tumors, the researchers say, because there is currently no approved...
Results from a multicenter randomized international trial of an innovative treatment show a marked improvement in the length of time patients with midgut neuroendocrine tumors experience progression-free survival, researchers reported at the 2015 European Cancer Congressin Vienna, Austria, on...
Millions of people are unable to receive necessary treatment worldwide because of a chronic underinvestment in radiotherapy resources, according to a major new Commission on access to radiotherapy, published in by Atun et al in The Lancet Oncology, and presented at the 2015 European Cancer Congress ...
First results from the largest international comparison of the treatment of elderly patients with breast cancer have shown substantial differences in the use of surgery, hormone therapy, and chemotherapy among European countries. The European Registration of Cancer Care (EURECCA) study compared the ...
Small cell lung cancer (SCLC) is an aggressive disease that is difficult to treat and is frequently diagnosed only when it has metastasized. Five-year survival rates in SCLC, which accounts for about 14% of all lung cancers, are very low, at only 6%. Researchers presented novel findings (Abstract...
In a special session on cancer in pregnancy at the 2015 European Cancer Congress (Abstract 3205), Frédéric Amant, MD, PhD, said that new results from a study of 129 children, aged 1–3, born after prenatal exposure to cancer treatment, showed normal development of their...
Living in overcrowded conditions appears to protect children and young adults against developing a particular type of Hodgkin lymphoma. This protective effect seems to suggest that infections earlier in life may stimulate the immune system to deal with future infections and cancerous cells more...
Unraveling the genetic sequences of cancer that has spread to the brain could offer unexpected targets for effective treatment, according to new research (Abstract 2905) presented at the 2015 European Cancer Congress in Vienna, Austria, and published simultaneously by Brastianos et al in...
Young women undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer may be more likely to remain fertile if they also receive hormonal treatment, according to new research (Abstract 1957) presented at the 2015 European Cancer Congress in Vienna, Austria, and published simultaneously by Lambertini et al in Annals ...
Over 80% of the 15 million people diagnosed with cancer worldwide in 2015 will need surgery, but less than one-quarter of them will have access to proper, safe, affordable surgical care when they need it, according to a major new Commission examining the state of global cancer surgery. The...
Aspirin improved survival in patients with tumors situated throughout the gastrointestinal tract, results from a large study in the Netherlands showed. This is the first time that survival data from patients with tumors in different gastrointestinal locations have been analyzed at the same time;...
Each year in Europe, 6,000 young people die from cancer, and two-thirds of those who survive suffer from treatment-related side effects. Although there has been considerable progress in the treatment of childhood cancers over the past few decades, and cancer in childhood is rare, these are major...
Patients with cancers of the mid and lower throat may have higher survival rates if their initial treatment includes surgery, according to new research (Abstract 2804) presented at the 2015 European Cancer Congress in Vienna, Austria. Researchers explained that a nationwide study in Taiwan found...
The targeted drug nivolumab (Opdivo) significantly prolonged survival in patients with advanced kidney cancer whose disease had progressed after their first treatment, according to the results (Abstract 3LBA) presented at the 2015 European Cancer Congress (ECC) in Vienna, Austria, and published...
Comparisons of cancer patients’ survival and care in Europe up to 2007 showed that although more patients are surviving for at least 5 years after diagnosis, there are large variations among countries, which are particularly significant in cancers of the blood. Milena Sant, MD, from the...
Patients with advanced kidney cancer lived for nearly twice as long without their disease progressing if they were treated with cabozantinib (Cometriq), a drug that inhibits the action of tyrosine kinases. Toni Choueiri, MD, presented the research (Abstract 4LBA) at the Presidential Session of the...
Although most patients with breast cancer are cured after treatment, in about one in five patients, the cancer will recur, returning either to the same place as the original tumor or metastasizing to other parts of the body. Now, researchers have taken an important step toward understanding why...
Overall survival data from a phase II study, reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Ellis et al, suggest a benefit of first-line fulvestrant (Faslodex) vs anastrozole in postmenopausal women with estrogen receptor–positive advanced breast cancer. The study protocol was amended to...
Cytology-based screening has led to substantial declines in cervical cancer incidence and mortality since it was introduced in the 1940s. A population-based, cost-effective analysis investigating the benefits, costs, and cost-effectiveness of current cervical cancer screening practice, however, has ...