The first-in-class bifunctional antibody BCA101—which inhibits both the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) and transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-β)—given with the immune checkpoint inhibitor pembrolizumab, is showing activity and tolerability in recurrent or metastatic head and neck...
In patients with relapsed or metastatic head and neck squamous cell carcinoma, a regimen of the immune checkpoint inhibitor pembrolizumab plus carboplatin and paclitaxel, evaluated in the phase IV KEYNOTE-B10 trial, demonstrated antitumor activity, with a good safety profile, investigators reported ...
Pembrolizumab plus chemoradiation therapy failed to demonstrate a statistically significant improvement in event-free survival vs chemoradiation therapy alone in patients with locally advanced head and neck squamous cell carcinoma, but favorable numerical trends were demonstrated, according to...
The newly renamed Montefiore Einstein Comprehensive Cancer Center (MECCC) has been awarded comprehensive designation by the National Cancer Institute (NCI) of the National Institutes of Health. As a result, MECCC was awarded a 5-year, $20 million Cancer Center Support Grant to advance the...
The first-in-class bifunctional antibody BCA101—which inhibits both the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) and transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-β)—given with the immune checkpoint inhibitor pembrolizumab, is showing activity and tolerability in recurrent or metastatic head and neck...
Two phase III trials presented at the 2023 ASCO Annual Meeting explored treatments under study for patients with non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). In an exploratory analysis of the CodeBreaK 200 trial, the KRAS inhibitor sotorasib was compared with docetaxel chemotherapy in subsets of patients...
Sarah Cannon Research Institute (SCRI) recently announced that Vivek Subbiah, MD, has joined the organization as Chief, Early-Phase Drug Development. In his role, Dr. Subbiah will oversee SCRI’s nine drug development units and lead the expansion of early-phase capabilities and programs across the...
Cholesterol-lowering statins may reduce colorectal cancer incidence and mortality in patients with ulcerative colitis, according to a recent study published by Sun et al in eClinicalMedicine. The findings also suggested that statin use may be associated with a lower risk of all-cause mortality in...
In a phase I study reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Sacher et al found that the covalent KRAS G12C inhibitor divarasib (also referred to as GDC-6036) produced durable responses in patients with advanced or metastatic solid tumors with a KRAS G12C mutation. In the study, 137 patients ...
Fifty-two years ago, President Richard Nixon signed the National Cancer Act of 1971 into law, which established the National Cancer Institute (NCI) in its current form. At the time, the budget was $1.6 billion. Today, it is $7.8 billion, $4.5 billion less than the amount needed to keep up with...
In a Chinese phase II trial (TD-FOREKNOW) reported in JAMA Oncology, Lei et al found that the addition of neoadjuvant camrelizumab to platinum-based chemotherapy resulted in a higher pathologic complete response rate among patients with resectable stage IIIA or IIIB (T3N2) non–small cell lung...
As reported in The New England Journal of Medicine by Heather Wakelee, MD, and colleagues, an interim analysis of the phase III KEYNOTE-671 trial showed that the addition of neoadjuvant pembrolizumab to cisplatin-based chemotherapy followed by adjuvant pembrolizumab improved pathologic response and ...
Presented here are summaries of three abstracts from the 2023 ASCO Annual Meeting that are pertinent for patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer. The first two focus on men with homologous recombinant repair (HRR) gene alterations, including BRCA1/2. In the first study,...
At extended follow-up, lenvatinib plus pembrolizumab showed sustained superiority over sunitinib for overall and progression-free survival as first-line treatment for advanced renal cell carcinoma.1 The majority of the benefit was observed in intermediate- and poor-risk subgroups, according to the...
Urvi A. Shah, MD, Assistant Attending at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and Assistant Professor at Weill Cornell Medicine, New York, moderated the session where the MagnetisMM trial updates1,2 were reported and was interviewed by The ASCO Post. Elranatamab vs Teclistamab Dr. Shah noted...
On August 11, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the fixed-dose combination of niraparib and abiraterone acetate (Akeega), with prednisone, for adult patients with deleterious or suspected deleterious BRCA-mutated metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer, as determined by...
On June 20, 2023, the PARP inhibitor talazoparib was approved for use with enzalutamide in homologous recombination repair (HRR) gene–mutated metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer.1 Supporting Efficacy Data Approval was based on findings in the multicohort, double-blind TALAPRO-2 trial...
Presented here are summaries of three abstracts from the 2023 ASCO Annual Meeting that are pertinent for patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer. The first two focus on men with homologous recombinant repair (HRR) gene alterations, including BRCA1/2. In the first study,...
In a largely Asian phase III study (CARES-310) reported in The Lancet, Qin et al found that the combination of camrelizumab and rivoceranib (also known as apatinib) significantly prolonged progression-free and overall survival vs sorafenib in the first-line treatment of unresectable or metastatic...
In a Chinese phase III study reported in JAMA Oncology, Li et al found that niraparib maintenance therapy given with an individualized starting dose improved progression-free survival vs placebo in newly diagnosed patients with advanced ovarian cancer. Study Details In the double-blind multicenter...
In a phase II trial (NCI Protocol 10250) reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Ingham et al found that the combination of olaparib and temozolomide showed activity in previously treated patients with advanced uterine leiomyosarcoma. Study Details In the multicenter trial, 22 evaluable...
On July 20, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved quizartinib (Vanflyta) with standard cytarabine and anthracycline induction and cytarabine consolidation, and as maintenance monotherapy following consolidation chemotherapy, for the treatment of adults with newly diagnosed acute...
In the phase III IPSOS trial reported in The Lancet, Lee et al found that first-line atezolizumab improved overall survival vs single-agent chemotherapy in patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who were ineligible for platinum-based chemotherapy. Study Details In the open-label...
In a French phase II basket trial (AcSé Pembrolizumab) reported in The Lancet Oncology, Jean-Yves Blay, MD, and colleagues investigated the activity and safety of pembrolizumab in patients with rare sarcomas. AcSé Pembrolizumab is an ongoing phase II multitumor study investigating the activity of...
The addition of the PD-1 inhibitor sintilimab to standard induction chemotherapy and chemoradiotherapy resulted in a significant improvement in 3-year event-free survival, a manageable safety profile, and comparable quality of life in high-risk, locally advanced nasopharyngeal carcinoma vs standard ...
Investigators have discovered that cetuximab in addition to concurrent radiotherapy may be safe and effective at treating patients with locally advanced cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma, according to a recent study published by Chang et al in Oncotarget. Treatment for locally advanced cutaneous...
Assessments of the health impacts of the nonsugar sweetener aspartame were released today by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) and the World Health Organization (WHO)/Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Joint Expert Committee on Food Additives (JECFA). Citing “limited...
In the phase I/II BRUIN trial reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Anthony R. Mato, MD, and colleagues found that the noncovalent (reversible) Bruton’s tyrosine kinase (BTK) inhibitor pirtobrutinib exhibited strong activity in patients with relapsed or refractory chronic lymphocytic...
Immunotherapeutics that target human papillomavirus (HPV) genotype 16 appear to boost the activity of pembrolizumab in advanced head and neck squamous cell carcinoma. Two examples were presented in posters at the 2023 ASCO Annual Meeting.1,2 The phase II VERSATILE-002 trial evaluated PDS0101,...
After a 4-year hiatus because of the COVID-19 pandemic, ASCO’s Breakthrough meeting is returning to Asia from August 3–5, 2023, in Yokohama, Japan, and will also be livestreamed (https://conferences.asco.org/breakthrough/welcome). Launched in 2019 in Bangkok, Thailand, “Breakthrough is ASCO’s...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Jianming Xu, MD, of Fifth Medical Center, Chinese PLA General Hospital, Beijing, corresponding author Harry H. Yoon, MD, of the Department of Oncology, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, and colleagues, an interim analysis of the phase III RATIONALE-306 trial has shown...
At extended follow-up, lenvatinib plus pembrolizumab showed sustained superiority over sunitinib for overall and progression-free survival as first-line treatment for advanced renal cell carcinoma.1 The majority of the benefit was observed in intermediate- and poor-risk subgroups, according to the...
Neoadjuvant therapy with pembrolizumab plus platinum-based chemotherapy followed by surgery and then adjuvant pembrolizumab led to significantly improved event-free survival in patients with resectable stage II and III non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) compared with platinum-based chemotherapy...
In the Spanish phase II NADIM II trial reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Mariano Provencio, MD, PhD, and colleagues found that the addition of nivolumab to platinum-based chemotherapy improved pathologic complete response (pCR) rates among patients with resectable stage IIIA or IIIB...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by O’Donnell et al, findings in a cohort of the phase Ib/II EV-103/KEYNOTE-869 study showed durable responses with first-line enfortumab vedotin-ejfv plus pembrolizumab in cisplatin-ineligible patients with locally advanced or metastatic urothelial...
Researchers have created the world’s largest and most comprehensive atlas of normal breast tissue—the Human Breast Cell Atlas—which may provide an unprecedented understanding of mammary biology and help identify therapeutic targets for diseases such as breast cancer, according to a recent study...
About 50% of LGBTQ+ patients and survivors of cancer may be concerned about facing discrimination in a health-care setting, according to a new survey from the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network (ACS CAN). The new findings demonstrated that these concerns and experiences with...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Emmanuel S. Antonarakis, MD, and colleagues, the phase III KEYLYNK-010 trial has shown no improvement in survival outcomes with pembrolizumab/olaparib vs a next-generation hormonal agent (abiraterone or enzalutamide) in previously treated patients...
New research involving people living with HIV treated with immune checkpoint inhibitors has provided valuable insights into the safety and efficacy of immunotherapy in this historically excluded population, according to data published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.1 The real-world data...
The immune checkpoint inhibitor pembrolizumab achieved high response rates in patients with unresectable metastatic desmoplastic melanoma, a rare invasive tumor type, according to the results of the phase II SWOG S1512 trial presented at the 2023 American Association for Cancer Research (AACR)...
In the phase I/II BRUIN trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Michael Wang, MD, and colleagues found that the noncovalent (reversible) Bruton’s tyrosine kinase (BTK) inhibitor pirtobrutinib produced durable responses in patients with mantle cell lymphoma who were previously treated...
For some precancerous cells, traveling from the bone marrow to the skin can trigger genetic transformations that can result in leukemia, according to a novel study published by Griffin et al in Nature. The new findings may have shed light on what researchers have termed the “genetic travelogue” of...
Narjust Florez, MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and Ferdinandos Skoulidis, MD, PhD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discuss results of a biomarker subgroup analysis, showing that sotorasib demonstrated consistent clinical benefit vs docetaxel in all molecularly defined...
New research involving people living with HIV treated with immune checkpoint inhibitors has provided valuable insights into the safety and efficacy of immunotherapy in this historically excluded population, according to data published by El Zarif et al in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. The...
In a UK phase II trial (MAJIC-PV) reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Harrison et al found that ruxolitinib produced a higher complete response rate vs best available therapy in patients with polycythemia vera intolerant of or resistant to hydroxycarbamide. Study Details In the...
The addition of a checkpoint inhibitor to standard chemotherapy as first-line treatment of advanced endometrial cancer reduced the risk of disease progression or death by 70% in patients with mismatch repair–deficient (dMMR) tumors in two recent phase III studies. The results of the two...
On April 3, 2023, enfortumab vedotin-ejfv with pembrolizumab was granted accelerated approval for patients with locally advanced or metastatic urothelial carcinoma ineligible for cisplatin-containing chemotherapy.1,2 Enfortumab vedotin-ejfv is an antibody-drug conjugate targeting nectin 4....
The invited discussant for the CodeBreaK 200 trial, Jarushka Naidoo, MBBCh, MHS, Professor of Medical Oncology and Consultant Medical Oncologist at Beaumont RCSI Cancer Centre in Dublin, underscored the importance of patient-reported outcomes in evaluating the effectiveness of oncology treatments,...
The latest research on sotorasib, a targeted therapy for KRAS G12C–mutated non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), reveals that patients may experience better quality of life while benefiting from improved clinical outcomes. Analysis of patient-reported outcomes presented during the European Lung...
The search for an effective cancer vaccine has been frustrating, but finally there may be light at the end of the tunnel. Adjuvant use of an investigational personalized mRNA vaccine (mRNA-4157) plus the PD-1 inhibitor pembrolizumab improved recurrence-free survival vs pembrolizumab alone in...