Each year, investigators from the Institute of Cancer Research (ICR), London, and the Royal Marsden NHS Trust collaborate to showcase images from their research to highlight the often unseen beauty of science. Maxine Lam, PhD, a postdoctoral training fellow at ICR captured an image of a cancer...
This week, we review a phase II trial of erdafitinib in urothelial carcinoma with an FGFR alteration. We also talk about a report from the World Health Organization on tobacco use worldwide. Then, we discuss two recent U.S. Food and Drug Administration approvals in prostate cancer and a rare joint...
Researchers have developed a new method for tracking residual disease in patients with breast cancer that could one day help doctors better tailor treatments and prevent unnecessary surgeries for some people with the disease. Findings were published by McDonald et al in Science Translational...
New data suggest that people who have a parent, sibling, or child with blood cancer have a higher likelihood of being diagnosed with a hematologic malignancy themselves. A study by Sud et al published in Blood offers the first...
A new study published by Stump et al in Genetics in Medicine investigated whether genetic testing would motivate people at risk of developing melanoma to alter their behavior in order to reduce their risk. “We are trying to understand whether a genetic test result adds value over and above...
In a single-center study reported in The Lancet Oncology, Calais et al found that the use of gallium Ga-68 prostate-specific membrane antigen-11 positron-emission tomography/computed tomography (PSMA PET/CT) resulted in higher detection rates of early biochemical recurrence of prostate cancer after ...
On July 10, ASCO led a coalition in a day of action in support of the Covering Life-Saving Investigations Needed in Cancer and Other Life-Threatening Conditions Through Timely Use of Resources for Easy and Affordable Treatment from Medicaid for Enrollees in Need Today Act (CLINICAL TREATMENT Act,...
A new report published by DeSantis et al in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians examined cancer statistics in adults 85 and older and found incidence and mortality trends are generally similar to those in people aged 65 to 84 years, but disease screening rates are unexpectedly high and survival is...
ASCO Answers are the ideal take-home resource for your patients. Direct, easy to understand, and in a convenient single-page format, ASCO Answers fact sheets introduce patients and their caregivers to types of cancer and cancer-related topics, including treatments and side effects. Each fact sheet...
According to research published by Boas et al in the American Journal of Roentgenology, aspirin therapy is associated with improved liver function test results and survival after transarterial embolization for hepatocellular carcinoma. Findings In a retrospective review of 304 patients, among the ...
In a study reported in the Journal of Oncology Practice, Duckworth et al found that many patients with cancer had more optimistic treatment goals vs their physicians and that patients who did not understand adverse effects associated with treatment had higher distress scores. As stated by the...
The Journal of Oncology Practice (JOP) is pleased to announce a call for papers on a thematic issue devoted to physician burnout and moral distress in the adult and pediatric oncology setting. This special series will address ethical, cultural, social, personal, psychological, and organizational...
Conquer Cancer®, the ASCO Foundation, is pleased to announce the recipients of its 2019 ASCO Annual Meeting Merit Awards. These distinguished awards support oncology trainees who were first authors on abstracts selected for presentation at the ASCO Annual Meeting. This year, Conquer Cancer...
The American Society of Hematology (ASH) will recognize Richard Aster, MD, of the Medical College of Wisconsin and Versiti Blood Center of Wisconsin in Milwaukee with the 2019 Wallace H. Coulter Award for Lifetime Achievement in Hematology. Dr. Aster will be honored for his significant...
GUEST EDITOR Geriatrics for the Oncologist is guest edited by Stuart M. Lichtman, MD, FACP, FASCO, and developed in collaboration with the International Society of Geriatric Oncology (SIOG). Dr. Lichtman is an Attending Physician at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Commack, New York, and...
In the phase II EV-201 trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Rosenberg et al found the antibody-drug conjugate enfortumab vedotin showed high activity in patients with metastatic urothelial carcinoma who had previously received platinum-based therapy and anti–programmed cell...
Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center, part of the University of Miami Leonard M. Miller School of Medicine, has been named a National Cancer Institute (NCI)-designated cancer center. The NCI designation recognizes Sylvester as among the top cancer centers in the United States. Sylvester joins a...
On August 7, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) finalized the decision to cover U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy among recipients of Medicare benefits. FDA-approved CAR T-cell therapies are approved to...
The state of Washington is adding a public option to its health insurance marketplace; Massachusetts, Connecticut, and others have passed laws requiring that payers cover fertility preservation procedures for patients with cancer. Many states are seeking to expand Medicaid eligibility, and some, in ...
The National Cancer Institute (NCI) has increased monetary support to the University of Hawai’i (UH) Cancer Center from $5.7 million to $8.4 million and has extended the term of the current NCI designation by an additional year, until July 2022. The funding supports the core research infrastructure ...
The American Oncology Network, LLC (AON) has announced that Hope Cancer Care of Nevada, a leading community oncology/hematology practice in Las Vegas, will join AON, effective July 1, 2019. The American Oncology Network is an alliance of physicians and veteran health-care leaders working to ensure...
The Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard recently announced a new $15 million commitment by Louis V. Gerstner, Jr, former Corporate Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board of IBM Corporation, and Current Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Broad Institute, to create the Gerstner Center for...
Breast cancer researcher and innovator Laura J. van ’t Veer, PhD, was born and reared in Amsterdam in 1957. “During high school, I had a wonderful biology teacher who was going through his own biology studies at the University of Amsterdam, and he was bringing that university-level education into...
On June 10, 2019, the CD79b-directed antibody-drug conjugate polatuzumab vedotin-piiq was granted accelerated approval for use in combination with bendamustine and a rituximab product for adult patients with relapsed or refractory diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), not otherwise specified,...
COTA, Inc, a precision medicine technology company, announced that it has signed a 2-year Research Collaboration Agreement with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Information Exchange and Data Transformation (INFORMED) Program, the Agency’s data science and technology incubator that...
Larry Kwak, MD, PhD, has been appointed the Deputy Director of City of Hope’s Hematologic Malignancies and Stem Cell Transplantation Institute. Tanya Siddiqi, MD, Associate Clinical Professor in City of Hope’s Department of Hematology & Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation, has been appointed...
Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center, the Greenberg Bladder Cancer Institute, the Bloomberg-Kimmel Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy, the Brady Urological Institute, and the Center for Computational Genomics at Johns Hopkins have received a $3.2 million grant from the National...
The American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) recently announced its newly elected class of Fellows of the AACR Academy. The mission of the AACR Academy is to recognize and honor distinguished scientists whose scientific contributions have propelled innovation and progress against cancer. The ...
As part of The ASCO Post’s coverage of the 2019 ASCO Annual Meeting, featured here are four abstracts from different clinical trials evaluating newer treatments for Waldenström’s macroglobulinemia and T-cell lymphomas. Waldenström’s Macroglobulinemia ABSTRACT 7509: Outcomes with bendamustine plus ...
In a study published by Salem et al in Circulation, researchers examined how several testosterone-blocking drugs commonly used in the treatment of prostate cancer affect the heart's QT interval. The longer a QT interval—typically measured by an electrocardiogram—the more at risk a ...
People whose diets included high levels of vitamin A had a 17% reduction in risk for developing cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma, as compared to those who ate modest amounts of foods and supplements rich in vitamin A. These findings were published by Kim et al in JAMA Dermatology. Vitamin A is...
In a systematic review and meta-analysis reported in JAMA Oncology, Lu et al found that multiplex immunohistochemistry/immunofluorescence (mIHC/IF) assays appeared to have greater accuracy vs other types of assays in predicting response to anti–programmed cell death protein 1/programmed cell...
In the phase III ECOG-ACRIN 5508 trial, reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Ramalingam et al, maintenance pemetrexed or bevacizumab was associated with no significant improvement in overall survival vs the bevacizumab control group alone, and was associated with greater toxicity in...
On June 17, 2019, pembrolizumab was granted accelerated approval for the treatment of patients with metastatic small cell lung cancer (SCLC) with disease progression on or after platinum-based chemotherapy and at least one other prior line of therapy.1,2 Supporting Efficacy Data Approval was based...
Rachel Gibson, PhD, was named the recipient of MASCC’s 2019 Distinguished Service Award, MASCC’s highest honor. The award is made in recognition of meritorious achievement and outstanding contributions to the society. Dr. Gibson has just been appointed inaugural Professor and Director, Allied...
Intimacy changes after a cancer diagnosis. Both male and female survivors can experience significant sexual dysfunction, pain with sex, loss of desire, and a slew of other clinical and psychological sequelae. To make matter worse, sexual function is often not discussed by patients and their...
On March 18, 2019, atezolizumab was approved for use in combination with carboplatin and etoposide in the first-line treatment of adult patients with extensive-stage small cell lung cance (SCLC).1,2 Supporting Efficacy Data Approval was based on findings in the phase III double-blind IMpower133...
The Global Coalition for Adaptive Research (GCAR) announced recently that the GBM AGILE clinical trial is opening its first clinical site, the Henry Ford Cancer Institute, and has begun enrolling patients. GBM AGILE is the world’s first global adaptive clinical trial platform for glioblastoma and...
On July 24, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requested that Allergan, the manufacturer of a specific type of textured breast implant, recall specific models of its textured implants from the U.S. market due to the risk of breast implant–associated anaplastic large cell lymphoma (ALCL)....
Huntsman Cancer Institute (HCI) at the University of Utah is the first Regence provider designated as a national Blue Distinction Center for Cellular Immunotherapy. Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy (CAR–T)-designated hospitals must be certified by a Risk Evaluation and Mitigation...
On July 24, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved rituximab-pvvr -(Ruxience), a biosimilar to rituximab (Rituxan), for the treatment of adult patients with non-Hodgkin lymphoma, chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), and granulomatosis with polyangiitis and microscopic polyangi-itis....
Chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy is a major clinical problem, and better therapies are needed for both its treatment and prevention. According to Charles Loprinzi, MD, a medical oncologist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, to devise better preventive and treatment approaches,...
In patients with extensive-stage small cell lung cancer (SCLC), adding trilaciclib to standard-of-care chemotherapy demonstrated meaningful delays in deterioration of myelosuppression-related symptoms, according to Jared Weiss, MD, of the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, Chapel Hill,...
The 2019 ASCO Annual Meeting featured a wealth of presentations on important topics. In addition to our regular news coverage of the meeting, we present below some highlights of other studies that add to our knowledge base for treatment of various cancers. Olaratumab in Soft-Tissue Sarcoma...
In a study reported in the Journal of Oncology Practice, Greenup et al found that cancer treatment costs influenced women’s decisions on breast cancer surgery. Researchers reported many women, even at the highest income levels, said that costs were higher than expected, and that most women...
Immunotherapy as a treatment for advanced solid cancers has rapidly evolved over the past decade—often yielding remarkable results. However, its use has also given way to new adverse effects, including drug-induced gastrointestinal and liver toxicities. “Checkpoint inhibitors are a...
Diversity, inclusion, and gender equality were prevalent themes for 2019 that ran throughout the ASCO Annual Meeting. From the first year that featured free onsite child care for attendees, to a session on “Establishing a Mutually Respectful Environment in the Workplace,” as well as a Plenary...
GUEST EDITOR Addressing the evolving needs of cancer survivors at various stages of their illness and care, Palliative Care in Oncology is guest edited by Jamie H. Von Roenn, MD, FASCO. Dr. Von Roenn is ASCO’s Vice President of Education, Science, and Professional Development. During the 2019...
The three-drug combination of encorafenib (a BRAF inhibitor), binimetinib (a MEK inhibitor), and cetuximab (an EGFR inhibitor) significantly improved overall survival in patients with BRAF-mutated metastatic colorectal cancer, according to the results of the phase III BEACON CRC clinical trial....
Artificial intelligence (AI) may improve the efficiency and accuracy of an advanced imaging technology used to screen for breast cancer, according to a study published by Conant et al in Radiology: Artificial Intelligence. Digital breast tomosynthesis is an advanced method for cancer...