Men with higher levels of free (biologically active) testosterone and insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) in their blood are more likely to be diagnosed with prostate cancer, according to research presented by Travis et al at the 2019 National Cancer Research Institute (NCRI) Cancer Conference....
Testing for levels of the serum biomarker cancer antigen 125 (CA125) in the blood may be a useful tool for the detection of ovarian cancer, and could help detect other types of cancer among patients in primary care, according to research presented by Funston et al at the 2019 National Cancer...
On September 26, 2019, daratumu-mab (Darzalex) was approved in combination with bortezomib, thalidomide, and dexamethasone for the treatment of multiple myeloma in newly diagnosed adult patients eligible for autologous stem cell transplantation (ASCT).1,2 Supporting Efficacy Data Approval was based ...
Several oncology organizations have created guidelines for oncology specialists to help patients with cancer to quit smoking. ASCO has far-reaching goals aimed at tobacco reduction, including cessation tools and other resources. To shed light on the current work in this area, The ASCO Post spoke...
A study by Geoffrey R. Oxnard, MD, and colleagues using bisulfite sequencing of plasma cell-free DNA to identify methylomic signatures for multicancer detection and tissue-of-origin determination found the assay achieved accurate detection of multiple cancers across stages and tissue-of-origin...
Despite the spate of recent drug approvals in blood cancer, it’s been more than 13 years since the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved a treatment for myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS), a bone marrow disorder characterized by ineffective hematopoiesis. Nevertheless, data from a...
As reported by Alice T. Shaw, MD, and colleagues in The Lancet Oncology, a phase I/II trial has shown overall and intracranial activity of the third-generation ALK and ROS1 tyrosine kinase inhibitor lorlatinib in patients with advanced ROS1-positive non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Lorlatinib...
The American College of Physicians has issued a new guidance statement on colorectal cancer screening, which recommends screening for average-risk adults who do not have symptoms and are between the ages of 50 and 75 years. The guidelines were published by Qaseem et al in Annals of Internal...
A small phase II study investigating the efficacy and safety of the investigational farnesyl transferase inhibitor tipifarnib in patients with recurrent and metastatic HRAS-mutant head and neck squamous cell carcinoma found the agent produced objective responses in the patient population. Based on...
Recently, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted Priority Review to trastuzumab deruxtecan for the treatment of HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer; granted Fast Track designation for bemcentinib for elderly patients with relapsed acute myeloid leukemia (AML); granted Breakthrough...
Nothing prepared me for a diagnosis of diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) in the fall of 2016. I had none of the typical symptoms of the cancer, such as night sweats, enlarged lymph nodes, or fatigue. In fact, my energy level was as high as ever, as I traveled around the country for business,...
On August 16, 2019, fedratinib was approved for the treatment of adults with intermediate-2 or high-risk primary or secondary (post-polycythemia vera or post-essential thrombocythemia) myelofibrosis.1,2 Supporting Efficacy Data The approval was based on findings from the phase III double-blind...
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,...
On September 17, 2019, the combination of pembrolizumab plus lenvatinib was granted accelerated approval for the treatment of patients with advanced endometrial carcinoma that is not microsatellite instability–high (MSI-H) or mismatch repair–deficient (dMMR) and who have disease progression...
African American and Hispanic patients with multiple myeloma generally start treatment with novel therapy significantly later than white patients, according to a study published by Ailawadhi et al in Blood Advances. The study found that, on average, it took about 3 months for white patients to...
The American College of Clinical Pharmacology (ACCP) presented Peter Wiernik, MD, with the Nathaniel T. Kwit Memorial Distinguished Service Award at the ACCP’s Annual Meeting in September. Dr. Wiernik is Director of the Cancer Research Foundation of New York. The Nathaniel T. Kwit Memorial...
On October 18, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a supplemental biologics license application (sBLA) for romiplostim (Nplate) to include new data in its U.S. prescribing information showing sustained platelet responses in adults with immune thrombocytopenia. The updated...
The advent of new targeted agents for chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) has ushered in a golden age of treatment, leading to longer, more durable periods of disease control. Not all oncologists are convinced, however, that improvements in progression-free survival alone warrant dispensing with...
Tailored exercise may help to minimize cardiotoxicity in patients with cancer, according to a report published by D’Ascenzi et al in the European Journal of Preventive Cardiology. Cardiovascular diseases are common side effects in patients with cancer. This is the result of cardiotoxicity, whereby...
Recently, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted Fast Track designation to a therapy for steroid-refractory acute graft-vs-host disease and granted Orphan Drug designation to a therapy for peripheral T-cell lymphoma. Fast Track Designation for T-Guard in Steroid-Refractory Acute...
Formal discussant of the ASCEND-7 trial, Lizza E. Hendriks, MD, PhD, of the Maastricht University Medical Center, The Netherlands, said that up to 50% of patients with non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) will develop central nervous system (CNS) metastases, and these patients can have poor quality...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Kato et al, the phase III ATTRACTION-3 trial conducted in predominantly Asian patients has shown a survival benefit with nivolumab vs paclitaxel or docetaxel in patients with advanced esophageal squamous cell carcinoma who were refractory to or intolerant of...
Over half of patients treated with the Bruton’s tyrosine kinase inhibitor ibrutinib developed new or worsened high blood pressure within 6 months of starting the medication, according to a study published by Dickerson et al in Blood. The analysis is also the first to tie ibrutinib-related...
In a meta-analysis published by Deng et al in Cancer Medicine, researchers found parenchymal-sparing hepatectomy was associated with better perioperative outcomes vs extended hepatectomy for the treatment of colorectal cancer liver metastases, without compromising long-term oncologic outcomes. The...
A novel multivariate cancer risk score model demonstrated 60% sensitivity at 98.5% specificity. These findings demonstrate that a blood-based cancer screening assay with a novel risk score model may be a viable method for detecting cancer in asymptomatic individuals, especially in populations at...
GUEST EDITORS Dr. Abutalib is Associate Director, Hematology and Cellular Therapy Program and Director, Clinical Apheresis Program Cancer Treatment at Centers of America, Zion, Illinois; Associate Professor, Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science; and Founder and Co-Editor of...
As reviewed in this issue of The ASCO Post, Shanafelt and colleagues recently published the interim analysis of E1912, a U.S. Intergroup–led randomized phase III trial comparing ibrutinib/rituximab, followed by ibrutinib to disease progression vs 6 months of fludarabine, cyclophosphamide, and...
A metabolic imbalance in some patients with cancer, following treatment with the checkpoint inhibitor nivolumab, may be associated with resistance to immunotherapy and shorter survival, according to scientists from Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, in collaborative work with the Broad Institute of...
In the Clinic provides overviews of novel oncology agents, addressing indications, mechanisms of action, administration recommendations, safety profiles, and other essential information needed for the appropriate clinical use of these drugs. On August 15, 2019, the oral TRK, ROS1, and ALK kinase...
Jame Abraham, MD, FACP, has been appointed the new Chair of the Hematology/Medical Oncology Department at Cleveland Clinic. In this capacity, he will recruit and develop staff as well as guide the department’s focus on patient access and a multidisciplinary approach to care. Dr. Abraham currently...
In an interim analysis of a U.S. phase III trial (E1912) reported in The New England Journal of Medicine,1 Tait D. Shanafelt, MD, of Stanford University School of Medicine, and colleagues found that ibrutinib/rituximab improved progression-free and overall survival vs standard chemoimmunotherapy in ...
Exposure to e-cigarette smoke caused mice to develop lung cancer, according to findings from a preclinical study published by Tang et al in the Proceedings of National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS). The study found that 9 of 40 mice (22.5%) exposed to e-cigarette smoke...
GUEST EDITOR Integrative Oncology is guest edited by Jun J. Mao, MD, MSCE, Laurance S. Rockefeller Chair in Integrative Medicine and Chief of Integrative Medicine Service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York. The ASCO Post’s Integrative Oncology series is intended to facilitate...
Recurrent high-grade glioblastoma has a poor prognosis, with a median overall survival of 6 to 9 months. Treatment is limited, partly because immunotherapy has not yet been shown to be effective in the immunosuppressive microenvironment of this tumor. A novel treatment approach involving...
Patients with advanced lung cancer might soon be offered a blood test that could help decide the best treatment for them, instead of relying on tumor biopsy analysis. New data from the BFAST trial presented by Gadgeel et al at the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) Congress 2019 (Abstract ...
In the past few weeks, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued regulatory decisions in prostate cancer, urothelial cancer, myelofibrosis, breast cancer, pediatric brain cancer, leukemia, and skin cancer. Breakthrough Therapy Designation for Niraparib in Metastatic...
In late August, experts from around the globe convened in Basel, Switzerland, at the 2019 Advanced Prostate Cancer Consensus Conference (APCCC) to discuss controversial areas related to the management of advanced prostate cancer. Although the full proceedings of the conference will be published in...
Recurrent high-grade glioblastoma has a poor prognosis, with a median overall survival of 6 to 9 months. Treatment is limited, partly because immunotherapy has not yet been shown to be effective in the immunosuppressive microenvironment of this tumor. A novel treatment approach involving...
Patients with advanced colon cancer and plasma samples containing circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) were less likely to achieve 2-year disease-free survival with oxaliplatin-based adjuvant treatment than patients with ctDNA-negative samples, according to findings presented at the European Society for...
The novel FLT3 inhibitor gilteritinib prolonged survival in patients with FLT3-mutated relapsed or refractory acute myeloid leukemia (AML) across all mutation cohorts, including NPM1, DNMT3A, DNMT3A/NPM1, and WT1, with the greatest benefit seen in patients with NPM1 and DNMT3A co-mutations,...
In analyses reported at the 2019 Society of Hematologic Oncology (SOHO) Annual Meeting and published in Clinical Lymphoma, Myeloma & Leukemia, Harrison et al identified response rates to the JAK2 inhibitor fedratinib among patients with myeloproliferative neoplasm–associated intermediate- or...
Hyperglycemia may induce DNA damage and inhibit DNA repair, which may explain why individuals with diabetes may have an increased risk for developing cancer, according to a researcher from City of Hope, Duarte, California, who presented these findings at the American Chemical Society (ACS) Fall...
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released a new national coverage determination (NCD) announcing that Medicare will now cover U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved chimeric antigen receptor T-cell (CAR T-cell) therapy for certain patients with cancer. As outlined in ...
The ASCO Post has offered comprehensive coverage of the 2019 ASCO Annual Meeting. To complement this news coverage, here are featured clinical trials of several treatments in chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). They focus on the monoclonal antibody obinutuzumab in combination therapy in the CLL14...
Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the noninvasive colorectal cancer screening test Cologuard for eligible average-risk individuals aged 45 years and older, expanding on its previous indication for those aged 50 years and older. Cologuard is a stool DNA-based colorectal...
The ASCO Post’s Integrative Oncology series is intended to facilitate the availability of evidence-based information on integrative and complementary therapies sometimes used by patients with cancer. In this installment, Ting Bao, MD, DABMA, MS, and Jyothirmai Gubili, MS, focus on flaxseed because...
In the Clinic provides overviews of novel oncology agents, addressing indications, mechanisms of action, administration recommendations, safety profiles, and other essential information needed for the appropriate clinical use of these drugs. Earlier this year, ado-trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1) was...
Tumor mutational burden failed to prove effective as a biomarker for response to chemotherapy plus checkpoint inhibitor or chemotherapy alone as first-line treatment for nonsquamous non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) in two different exploratory analyses of KEYNOTE trials.1,2 In both analyses,...
Although there may be a clear role for prophylactic anticoagulation in hospitalized patients and those undergoing surgery, indication for prophylactic anticoagulation for patients with cancer seen in the ambulatory setting has yet to emerge. Until clinical trial data on prophylactic...
Non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) accounts for the vast majority of all lung cancers—between 80% and 85% of those diagnosed in the United States—and is among the most deadly cancers for both men and women, exceeding the mortality rate of colon, breast, and pancreatic cancers combined. The results...