Pain, a debilitating consequence of cancer and its treatments, is highly prevalent among patients with advanced cancer.1 Often persistent and undertreated, it is associated with poor functional and emotional well-being and typically occurs along with insomnia and fatigue.2 The use of opioids,...
Natalie S. Callander, MD, of the University of Wisconsin Carbone Cancer Center, discusses advances in the treatment of patients with multiple myeloma, including her commentary on smoldering disease, the early use of CAR T-cell therapy, quadruplet therapy, and the use of multiple lines of treatment...
Investigators have uncovered persistent inequities in breast cancer that may systematically leave many patients behind in spite of recent improvements in research, treatment, and survival, according to a recent report from The Lancet Breast Cancer Commission. These findings were published by Coles...
In a phase II trial (NRG Oncology/GOG Study 279) reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Horowitz et al found that concurrent cisplatin, gemcitabine, and intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) produced a high rate of complete pathologic response in patients with locally advanced vulvar...
Geriatric assessment has emerged as a pivotal tool in optimizing cancer care for older patients, aiming to mitigate treatment toxicity, enhance treatment adherence, and improve quality of life. The recommended areas for evaluation in a geriatric assessment focus on identifying health issues that...
In a retrospective study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Kittai et al found that anti-CD19 chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy showed activity in previously treated patients with Richter transformation. Study Details In the study, 69 patients who received CAR T-cell therapy ...
Of 58 million people worldwide living with hepatitis C virus (HCV), one-sixth of them are found in sub-Saharan Africa.1 Yet, in that region, direct access to diagnostic testing and treatment is limited to less than 5%. HCV carries significant downstream implications including cirrhosis (30%–46%), ...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Layman et al, findings in dose-expansion groups of a phase Ib trial indicated activity of the pan-PI3K–mTOR inhibitor gedatolisib in combination with palbociclib and endocrine therapy in patients with hormone receptor (HR)-positive, HER2-negative advanced...
There is much debate about the necessity of treating women with ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) with surgery or radiotherapy.1,2 It is disconcerting to many that patients with DCIS are treated in the same way as are women with early-stage invasive breast cancer. Many patients with DCIS have...
Although more than 85% of childhood cancer survivors will achieve a 5-year survival,1 that does not tell the whole tale for these individuals who move into adulthood. They are at excess risk of late mortality, even 40 years out from a cancer diagnosis, from non–cancer-related causes,1 and related...
ASCO has released a new guideline on the treatment of patients with metastatic breast cancer in resource-constrained settings, where maximal setting–recommended treatments are not available.1 The guideline, designed for clinicians, policymakers, and patients, provides stratified recommendations...
The optimal management of high-risk prostate cancer remains a topic of ongoing investigation. The quest for therapy that maximizes cancer control while minimizing toxicity is constant. Over the past decade, there has been mounting evidence that the addition of a brachytherapy boost to external-beam ...
“The practice of medicine is an art, not a trade….” —Sir William Osler Mantle cell lymphoma (MCL) accounts for approximately 5% to 7% of all lymphomas; the median age of patients with MCL is between 60 and 70 years. This lymphoma is generally considered incurable. Median survival in retrospective...
Managing patients with lung cancer in the current era of an increasing array of systemic treatments has become a complex balancing act of trying to improve outcomes and survival from a cancer perspective while taking the necessary treatment and monitoring steps for cardioprotection. With few...
On March 14, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted accelerated approval to lisocabtagene maraleucel (Breyanzi), a CD19-directed chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy, for the treatment of adults with relapsed or refractory chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) or small...
The combination of the nectin-4–directed antibody-drug conjugate enfortumab vedotin-ejfv plus the PD-1 inhibitor pembrolizumab achieved favorable rates of progression-free survival, overall survival, and objective responses compared with chemotherapy among key subgroups of patients with previously...
Circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) has become an established biomarker of measurable or molecular residual disease (MRD) after curative-intent surgery in patients with colorectal cancer. The research focus is now on linking ctDNA to long-term outcomes and using it to guide treatment decisions—which was...
For patients with treatment-naive, locally advanced or metastatic esophageal squamous cell carcinoma, the addition of two checkpoint inhibitors to chemotherapy significantly improved not only progression-free survival but also overall survival, in the randomized, phase III SKYSCRAPER-08 trial...
The National Comprehensive Cancer Network® (NCCN®) is announcing several new updates to the cancer treatment practices listed in the NCCN Clinical Practice Guidelines in Oncology (NCCN Guidelines®). The evidence-based expert consensus recommendations are the most frequently updated guidelines for...
A new report from the President’s Cancer Panel offers recommendations in five priority areas to accelerate progress toward implementing the National Cancer Plan and achieving the Biden-Harris Administration’s Cancer Moonshot goal of ending cancer as we know it. The report, delivered to President...
For the third year in a row, more than 250 leaders in cancer care, including cancer center directors, physicians, scientists, ethicists, journalists, public officials, and patient advocates, gathered at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in Yorba Linda, California, to attend the...
Studies presented at the 2023 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium (SABCS) significantly moved the needle forward in our treatment of breast cancer. We are increasingly learning how to stratify risk, so we can optimize therapy and minimize our patients’ exposure to treatments that will not be...
Invited discussant Laura Huppert, MD, of the University of California, San Francisco, Comprehensive Cancer Center, focused her remarks on the need for biomarkers for selection of immunotherapy as part of neoadjuvant chemotherapy for hormone receptor–positive, HER2-negative breast cancer. “Hormone...
At a median follow-up of 8.4 years, adjuvant use of ado-trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1) continued to improve invasive disease–free survival and overall survival compared with trastuzumab in patients with HER2-positive early breast cancer with residual invasive disease after neoadjuvant therapy. These ...
Adding the antibody-drug conjugate ado-trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1) to the HER2-targeted agent tucatinib extended progression-free survival by about 2 months vs treatment with T-DM1 alone among patients with unresectable, locally advanced or metastatic HER2-positive breast cancer, according to...
Guest Editor’s Note: The use of mistletoe extract to support systemic therapy and improve quality of life for patients with cancer, though common, remains controversial. Promising results have been reported, but largely in trials that were not placebo-controlled nor properly randomized. In this...
Patients with unresectable hepatocellular carcinoma derived significant benefit from the addition of the monoclonal antibody durvalumab and the angiogenesis inhibitor bevacizumab to transarterial chemoembolization (TACE), which alone has been a standard of care for 20 years. Investigators of the...
About 4 years ago, I [Jo Cavallo] wrote about the death of my brother Dom from multiple myeloma in 2011 and my subsequent enrollment in the PROMISE trial (ClinicalTrials.gov identifier NCT03689595). My goal for enrolling in the study was twofold: to honor Dom and others with the cancer and to make ...
Adding the radioligand lutetium-177 dotatate (Lu-177 dotatate) to standard therapy almost tripled the median progression-free survival in patients with untreated, high-grade, gastroenteropancreatic neuroendocrine tumors in the randomized phase III NETTER-2 study, researchers reported at the 2024...
New diagnoses of six major cancer types in the United States fell abruptly in early 2020, coinciding with the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to findings from part 2 of the latest Annual Report to the Nation on the Status of Cancer.1 The volume of pathology reports also declined sharply...
For the treatment of high-risk, treatment-naive myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS), the regimen of venetoclax plus azacitidine led to high response rates, durable responses, and encouraging overall survival, in a phase Ib study reported at the 2023 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting...
In two international phase III trials in myelofibrosis, drugs given in combination with the Janus kinase (JAK) inhibitor ruxolitinib in JAK inhibitor–naive patients significantly improved outcomes vs ruxolitinib alone. Both studies were presented at the 2023 American Society of Hematology Annual...
Peter Voorhees, MD, a multiple myeloma specialist at Levine Cancer Institute and Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist Comprehensive Cancer Center, Durham, North Carolina, introduced the plenary presentation of the phase III IsKia trial by Gay et al and further commented on the study for The ASCO...
Research shows that about half of adults near the end of life in the United States are too ill to participate in decisions about whether to accept life-prolonging treatment,1 requiring family members and other proxies to serve as surrogate decision-makers for their critically ill loved ones....
In a pilot study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Eunice S. Wang, MD, and colleagues found that the combination of crenolanib and intensive chemotherapy produced high response rates in adults with newly diagnosed FLT3-mutated acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Crenolanib is a...
Over the past 2 years, my family and I have experienced firsthand the challenges of cancer. In the spring of 2021, my mother was diagnosed with stage IIB pancreatic cancer. She died in mid-2023 after developing metastatic disease, including peritoneal carcinomatosis. The experience has caused me to ...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Michael S. Hofman, MBBS, and colleagues, the Australian phase II TheraP trial has shown similar overall survival with lutetium-177–labeled PSMA-617 (LuPSMA; lutetium Lu 177 vipivotide tetraxetan) vs cabazitaxel in patients with prostate-specific membrane...
Michiel S. Van Der Heijden, MD, PhD, of the Netherlands Cancer Institute, discusses phase III results from the global EV-302 study, showing that enfortumab vedotin-ejfv plus pembrolizumab improves outcomes in patients with previously untreated locally advanced metastatic urothelial carcinoma...
It has been almost 20 years since the approval of trastuzumab for the treatment of early-stage, HER2-positive breast cancer. I remember returning from the 2005 ASCO Annual Meeting excited to offer patients a treatment that led to significant improvement in clinical outcomes. However, within a short ...
In January 2021, two of us wrote in these pages about our field’s pressing need to pivot away from identifying and deploying the maximum tolerated dose (MTD) when it comes to targeted oncology therapies.1 We argued that, instead, one should be looking for the “optimal dose”—the dose that best...
We have been taught that early cancer detection and treatment save lives. The way to cure cancer is to find it early and treat it aggressively. The public has subscribed to this approach in our struggle to “eradicate cancer.” In certain disease types, there is merit to this philosophy. The ability...
In the phase IIb KEYNOTE-942 trial reported in The Lancet, Jeffrey S. Weber, MD, PhD, and colleagues found that the addition of adjuvant mRNA-4157—a novel mRNA-based individualized neoantigen therapy—to pembrolizumab numerically improved recurrence-free survival in patients with completely resected ...
Harry P. Erba, MD, PhD, Professor of Medicine and Director of the Leukemia Program in the Division of Hematologic Malignancies and Cellular Therapy at Duke University School of Medicine, Durham, North Carolina, told The ASCO Post he was not surprised by one of the key findings reported by Smith et ...
Recent studies by multidisciplinary teams at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and Massachusetts General Hospital are illuminating novel ways to address health-care challenges faced by patients with cancer. The research, presented at the 2023 ASCO Quality Care Symposium, highlights the...
Invited discussant Laura Huppert, MD, of the University of California, San Francisco, Comprehensive Cancer Center, focused her remarks on the need for biomarkers for selection of immunotherapy as part of neoadjuvant chemotherapy for hormone receptor–positive, HER2-negative breast cancer. “Hormone...
In a systematic review and meta-analysis reported in JACC: CardioOncology, Fujisaki et al found no significant differences among direct oral anticoagulant agents (DOACs) in the prevention of recurrent venous thromboembolism (VTE) associated with active cancer, whereas significant differences in...
Late in 2023, Richardson et al shared the results of a phase I/II clinical trial (ClinicalTrials.gov identifier NCT03374085). They concluded that the “all-oral combination of mezigdomide plus dexamethasone showed promising efficacy in patients with heavily pretreated multiple myeloma.”1 Mezigdomide ...
In this installment of The ASCO Post ’s Living a Full Life series, guest editor Jame Abraham, MD, FACP, spoke with Naoto T. Ueno, MD, PhD, FACP, Director of the University of Hawaii Cancer Center. Along with his duties leading the cancer center, Dr. Ueno leads translational breast cancer research...
The Prevent Cancer Foundation has honored Matthijs Oudkerk, PhD, MD, MSc, with the prestigious James L. Mulshine, MD, International Leadership Award. Dr. Oudkerk is Professor of Radiology at the University of Groningen and Chief Scientific Officer of the Institute for Diagnostic Accuracy in the...
Although computed tomography (CT) screening has emerged as an essential tool for the early detection of lung diseases, there is still a broad range of potential improvements to be made. According to recent research, understanding the patterns of onset for earlier prediction of disease may be...