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Showing 27751 - 27800Can Obinutuzumab Benefit Patients With Rituximab-Refractory Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma?
Obinutuzumab is a glycoengineered type II antibody that differs from type I anti-CD20 antibodies by being associated with actin reorganization and adhesion followed by direct cell death.1 Obinutuzumab has been glycoengineered by reduction in fucose content of the Fc region, which increases its...
Obinutuzumab Shows Activity in Relapsed/Refractory Diffuse Large B-cell Lymphoma or Mantle Cell Lymphoma and Indolent Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma
Obinutuzumab is a type II, glycoengineered, humanized anti-CD20 monoclonal antibody. In the phase II GAUGUIN studies reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Franck Andre Morschhauser, MD, PhD, of Centre Hospitalier Régional Universitaire de Lille and Gilles A. Salles, MD, PhD, of Hospices...
Molecular Profiling Improves Classification of Nodal Peripheral T-Cell Lymphomas
One of the primary obstacles we face in caring for patients with peripheral T-cell lymphomas is a too often inadequate response to chemotherapy with low rates of progression-free and overall survival.1 And while more intensive treatment programs and the availability of novel agents give a greater...
Molecular Profiling Improves Classification of Nodal Peripheral T-Cell Lymphomas
The differential diagnosis of the most common peripheral T-cell lymphoma subtypes is difficult. In a diagnostic accuracy study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Pier Paolo Piccaluga, MD, PhD, of the University of Bologna, and colleagues in the European T-Cell Lymphoma Study Group and...
Merkel Cell Carcinoma: Hints of Immune Mediation May Enhance Treatment Options
Merkel cell carcinoma is a rare but aggressive skin cancer with poor outcomes and suboptimal therapeutic options. With a 46% mortality rate, it is three times more lethal than melanoma, and its reported incidence is rising. “Merkel cell carcinoma is a nasty cancer and we have zero FDA-approved...
Expert Point of View: Paul Sabbatini, MD
Paul Sabbatini, MD, attending physician at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York, said that Study 19 is a well-designed study that showed PARP inhibition is a successful maintenance therapy for serous ovarian cancer that avoids the toxicity associated with continued cytotoxic...
Olaparib Shows Robust Progression-Free Survival Benefit in Patients With BRCA Mutations
Maintenance therapy with olaparib extended progression-free survival and the time to disease progression after a second subsequent therapy in patients with platinum-sensitive relapsed serous ovarian cancer and a BRCA mutation, according to an updated analysis of Study 19 presented at the 2013 ASCO...
Researchers Identify Gene Variations in Lung Cancer Patients That May Help Predict an Individual's Treatment Response
Researchers at the Moffitt Cancer Center have identified four inherited genetic variants in patients with non–small cell lung cancer that can help predict survival and treatment response. Their findings, published in Carcinogenesis,1 could help lead to more personalized treatment options and...
Paul A. Bunn, Jr, MD, Offers Insights About a Hopeful Era in Lung Cancer Treatment
The treatment of non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) is rapidly evolving as molecular targets are being refined and targeted drugs are designed to combat acquired resistance. In his State of the Art Lecture at the 14th International Lung Cancer Congress, Dr. Bunn, Professor of Medicine and the James ...
Will Funding for Lung Cancer Ever Improve?
Lung cancer is the most common cause of cancer-related death in the world. In the United States alone, an estimated 228,190 new cases of lung cancer and 159,480 deaths from lung cancer will occur in 2013. These are alarming statistics when compared to the next four common causes of cancer-related...
Access to and Appropriate Use of Oncology Drugs Called Into Question by ASCO Studies
Studies presented at this year’s ASCO Annual Meeting suggest that despite the wealth of amazing oncolytics on the market, drug shortages persist, drug substitutions are common, off-label use of drugs occurs frequently, and patients find their costs burdensome. Drug Shortage Persists The shortage of ...
Addressing the Key Clinical Questions in Advanced Melanoma
At the 3rd Annual World Cutaneous Malignancies Congress, in La Jolla, California, Steven J. O’Day, MD, Director of Clinical Research at the Beverly Hills Cancer Center and Adjunct Member of the John Wayne Cancer Institute, Los Angeles, addressed what he labeled the “key clinical questions” about...
Cord Blood Transplantation Benefits Some Children With Juvenile Myelomonocytic Leukemia
A retrospective analysis of 110 patients with juvenile myelomonocytic leukemia found that single-unit, unrelated donor umbilical cord blood transplantation resulted in a 5-year disease-free survival rate of 44%. “Our data document that a significant proportion of children with this disease,...
Panobinostat Combined With Bortezomib and Dexamethasone Can Recapture Responses in Heavily Pretreated Patients
The combination of the investigational histone deacetylase inhibitor panobinostat (Faridak) with bortezomib (Velcade) and dexamethasone was able to recapture responses in 34.5% of heavily pretreated, bortezomib-refractory patients with multiple myeloma in the phase II PANORAMA 2 trial. The 55...
Many Patients With Head and Neck Cancer Report Being Depressed, but Few Use Mental Health Services
Despite a relatively high rate of depression among patients with head and neck cancer following radiation therapy, mental health services were severely underutilized in this group, concluded researchers who analyzed questionnaire results from 211 patients. The patients had been previously treated...
More Prudent Interpretation of Thyroid Ultrasound Could Reduce Unnecessary Biopsies
Thyroid ultrasound imaging could be used to identify patients who have a low risk of thyroid cancer for whom biopsy could be deferred, according to a retrospective case-control study reported in JAMA Internal Medicine. Reviewing 11,618 thyroid ultrasound imaging examinations from 8,806 patients...
Indoor Tanning Common Among Young White Females Despite Skin Cancer Risk
Indoor tanning, defined as using a tanning booth, sun bed, or sunlamp, is common among non-Hispanic white female high school students and young adults, despite risks of melanoma and nonmelanoma skin cancer, according to a study published online by JAMA Internal Medicine. Using data from the 2011...
Low Risk of Transformation to Melanoma for Biopsy-Diagnosed Mildly or Moderately Dysplastic Nevi
The risk of transformation to melanoma appears very low for biopsy-diagnosed mildly or moderately dysplastic nevi, and routine surgical excision of nevi with a positive biopsy margin may not be indicated. Patients with biopsy-diagnosed moderately-to-severely and severely atypical nevi, however,...
FDA on CLL Drug Approval and Expanded Access
The ASCO Post article, “Ibrutinib CLL Trial: Where is the Equipoise?” published in May 2013, inaccurately conveyed that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requires an improvement in overall survival for chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) drug approval and opposes allowing crossover in the...
Pharmacyclics' Reply
We acknowledge the letters submitted to The ASCO Post from a patient advocate and a chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) patient enrolled on the RESONATE study (PCYC-1112-CA). At Pharmacyclics, we are committed to adhering to high scientific and ethical standards as we strive to develop novel...
Clinical Trials, Crossover, and Clinical Equipoise: An Advocate's Perspective
In a previous issue of The ASCO Post, Dr. Susan O’Brien wrote, “It is my understanding that the FDA strongly opposed allowing crossover [in the RESONATE trial]. I presume that is because the FDA also wants to see if there is a survival advantage.”1 The lack of crossover seems a valid concern to me...
Clinical Trials, Crossover, and Clinical Equipoise: A Patient's Perspective
I am writing with regard to two articles on the ethical imperative of clinical equipoise written by Susan O’Brien, MD, and Stephen J. Schuster, MD, and published recently in The ASCO Post.1,2 I was a victim of Pharmacyclics’ policies during one of their randomized ibrutinib trials (PCI-32765)...
Preventing Tobacco Use in Children
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recently released its final recommendation statement on primary care interventions to prevent tobacco use in children and adolescents.1 The Task Force recommends that primary care clinicians provide interventions, including education or brief counseling, to...
CancerCare Co-Payment Assistance Foundation Launches New Technology to Provide Cancer Patients with Same-Day Approval
CancerCare® Co-Payment Assistance Foundation recently announced the launch of its new website and customer relationship management software, DiseaseTrak. Along with the implementation of DiseaseTrak, a customer-service platform, the Foundation will now provide same-day determination and...
California Stem Cell Agency Awards More than $40 Million in New Research Grants, including Funds for Prostate Cancer Research
The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine recently announced approval by the agency’s governing Board, the Independent Citizens Oversight Committee, of $40 million in funding for researchers at 10 institutions as part of its Early Translational IV Research awards. Among the institutions...
SIDEBAR: Expect Questions From Your Patients
Physicians and patients should engage in open discussion” about the complex issues of cancer screening, overdiagnosis, and overtreatment, according to a report from the chairs of a National Cancer Institute working group tasked with developing a strategy to improve the current approach to cancer...
Tackling Overdiagnosis and Overtreatment, by Words and by Deeds
The complexity of the pathologic condition called cancer,” according to a Viewpoint article in the Journal of the American Medical Association,1 “complicates the goal of early diagnosis.” Failure to recognize that cancers are heterogeneous, and that not all progress to metastases and death, can...
Prominent Surgeon and Teacher LaSalle D. Leffall, Jr, MD, Promotes Hard Work and Education to Overcome Boundaries
Reminiscing about his 65 years in medicine, LaSalle Doheny Leffall, Jr, MD, FACS, cites three events in his early childhood that would ultimately lead him to his position today as the Charles R. Drew Professor of Surgery at Howard University College of Medicine in Washington, DC. First, he was...
Genitourinary Cancer Expert Walter M. Stadler, MD, Named Section Chief of Hematology/Oncology at the University of Chicago Medicine
Walter M. Stadler, MD, an authority on prostate, kidney, bladder, and testicular cancers, has been named Chief of the Section of Hematology/Oncology at the University of Chicago Medicine. This position became effective August 15, 2013. Dr. Stadler, the Fred C. Buffet Professor of Medicine and...
The Oncologist as Author: On Guiding Patients Through Cancer
When Tumor Is the Rumor and Cancer Is the Answer is the guidebook to cancer that Kevin P. Ryan, MD, FACP, COL, USAF (ret) wished his patients had during his 30 years of practicing oncology. The book, recently published by AuthorHouse, is an authoritative, inspiring, and even philosophical guide for ...
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital Recognizes Childhood Cancer Awareness Month
Childhood cancer remains the leading cause of death by disease among young Americans. September marks Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, a time to highlight efforts to reduce the disease’s toll on children. At St. Jude, the past year has brought advances in understanding and treating childhood...
Oncology Meetings
September Inflammation, Microbiota, and CancerSeptember 19-20 • Bethesda, MarylandFor more information: ncifrederick.cancer.gov/events/microbiota/agenda.asp Continuum Cancer Centers of New York Conference on Quality of Care in OncologySeptember 20 • New York, New YorkFor more information:...
ASCO Launches New Site to Seek Feedback from Cancer Community on Clinical Practice Guidelines
ASCO has launched a new wiki site to engage the cancer community in its clinical practice guideline development process. The new site will provide oncologists, practitioners and patients with an opportunity to provide feedback or submit evidence on individual published guidelines and can be...
The Trials and Tribulations of a Revolutionary Cancer Drug
A modest brass plaque above a booth in the Eagle Pub in Cambridge, notes, “On this spot, on February 28, 1953, Francis Crick and James Watson declared the discovery of DNA with these words: ‘We have discoverewd the secret of life.’” Announcing a major scientific advance over a pint of ale is a far...
Cancer: Survivors in Focus Photo Exhibit Honors Cancer Survivors
In June, the David J. Sencer Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Museum in Atlanta, Georgia, opened a new photo exhibit featuring the faces of people living through and beyond a cancer diagnosis. The exhibit: Cancer: Survivors in Focus, tells the stories of cancer survivors while...
Celebrating 2 Decades as a Cancer Survivor
This past June, I celebrated 20 years of being a cancer survivor by throwing myself a party. It was an interesting experience because I learned that many of the 100 guests I invited were also cancer survivors or were family members of cancer survivors, and so we celebrated their lives as well. Our...
The Direction of Immunotherapy Over the Next Decade
The use of immunotherapy to target malignant cells in a variety of cancers—especially the PD-1 inhibitors lambrolizumab and nivolumab in the treatment of metastatic melanoma and the anti–PD-L1 agent MPDL3280A in the treatment of melanoma and lung, kidney, colorectal, and gastric cancers—made...
Final Publication of IOM Report on Learning Health Systems Available
The Institute of Medicine (IOM) has issued the final publication of its report, Best Care at Lower Cost: The Path to Continuously Learning Health Care in America. ASCO continues to support the IOM report’s core recommendations for establishing a “learning health system” in the United States and...
Conquering Cancer by Encouraging Diversity in the Field of Oncology
As the Conquer Cancer Foundation Grants and Awards Program has grown over the last 30 years, so has its purpose. Not only does the Grants and Awards Program support young researchers, foster mentoring relationships, and improve the quality of cancer care around the world, it also works to increase...
Communicating the Promise Science Offers to Society
ASCO President Clifford Hudis, MD, FACP, will be serving during a particularly notable year: 2014, the Society’s 50th anniversary. This occasion brings with it much to reflect on, from the advances in the field of oncology to the growth of ASCO’s influence, but Dr. Hudis takes a moment to simply...
Order Updated ASCO Answers Fact Sheets for Your Office or Waiting Room
ASCO Answers fact sheets give a one-page introduction to more than 40 types of adult and childhood cancers, as well as types of treatments and side effects. Each fact sheet provides an overview of the topic, a list of helpful terms, and a list of questions to ask the doctor. Download the fact...
Sustainable Growth Rate Bill Advances in the House
The U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee has unanimously approved the Medicare Patient Access and Quality Improvement Act of 2013, which replaces Medicare’s sustainable growth rate formula. The law would provide 5 years of stable Medicare payments beginning in 2014, with reimbursement rates...
ASCO Congratulates QOPI-Certified Practices
QCP™: Recognizing Excellence The QOPI® Certification Program (QCP™) recognizes medical oncology and hematology/oncology practices that are committed to delivering the highest quality of cancer care. QCP evaluates an individual practice’s performance in areas that affect patient care and safety. The ...
Robert S. Miller, MD, FACP, Appointed Editor-in-Chief of Cancer.Net
Robert S. Miller, MD, FACP, a medical oncologist and recognized authority in breast cancer, survivorship care, and consumer health informatics, has been appointed Editor-in-Chief of ASCO’s patient information website, Cancer.Net (www.cancer.net). He assumed this role at the 2013 ASCO Annual Meeting ...
Potential Prognostic Significance Shown for Interaction of Follicular Lymphoma Cells with Immune Microenvironment
It has been shown that CD4 and CD8 tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes in follicular lymphoma have impaired function and suppressed recruitment of critical signaling proteins to the immunologic synapse, and a number of studies have indicated the prognostic importance of the immune microenvironment in...
Sitimagene Ceradenovec/IV Ganciclovir in Glioblastoma: Legitimizing the Gene Therapy Approach for Brain Tumors
The ASPECT study,1 a randomized, open-label, phase III trial examining adenovirus-mediated gene therapy with sitimagene ceradenovec followed by IV ganciclovir for patients with operable high-grade glioma, is an important achievement for both neuro-oncology and gene therapy. As vector engineering...
Postresection Adenovirus-Mediated Gene Therapy Improves Time to Death/Reintervention but Not Survival in Adult Glioblastoma
In an open-label phase III trial (ASPECT) reported in Lancet Oncology, Manfred Westphal, MD, of University Hospital Eppendorf in Hamburg, and colleagues assessed the effects of locally applied adenovirus-mediated gene therapy with sitimagene ceradenovec followed by IV ganciclovir after surgical...
Lung Cancer Alliance Launches National Campaign to Increase Public Awareness of Lung CT Screening
Following the recent recommendation by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) that individuals most at risk for lung cancer be screened, Lung Cancer Alliance has launched a national multimedia public education campaign urging individuals to assess their risk for lung cancer. The “Moments” ...
Lidia Schapira, MD: Bridging Communication Gaps Between Oncologists and Patients
Communicating the intricacies of oncology care to vulnerable patients with cancer and their caregivers requires a firm grasp of the nuances of language. One of the oncology community’s true champions in the art of breaking down communication barriers is Lidia Schapira, MD, a medical oncologist at...
The BEATRICE Study: Where Does Targeting Breast Cancer Vasculature Stand in 2013?
Antiangiogenic strategies using the anti–vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) monoclonal antibody bevacizumab (Avastin) gained traction in breast cancer with the publication of the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) 2100 trial in 2007. That study demonstrated a progression-free survival ...
