In the largest series of its kind to date, researchers at Roswell Park Cancer Institute (RPCI) have shown that performing thoracoscopic pneumonectomy, removal of the entire lung through a minimally invasive endoscopic approach, at a high-volume center appears to be safe and may provide pain and...
A review of advance care planning and end-of-life communication practices among physicians by the American College of Physicians has found that implementing early discussions about goals of care with seriously ill patients results in better quality of life, reduced use of life-sustaining treatments ...
Adding interleukin-2 to gefitinib (Iressa) therapy resulted in threefold higher response rates in patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), according to a study by Bersanelli et al in Cancers. The addition of interleukin-2 enhanced the efficacy of gefitinib without negatively ...
A study investigating the prevalence and risk factors of oral human papillomavirus (HPV) infection among young men has found a higher prevalence of oral HPV among men who had female partners with an oral and/or genital HPV infection, suggesting that transmission may occur through oral or genital...
In the phase III Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) E-3193 (Intergroup 0142) trial, reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Tevaarwerk et al, adding ovarian function suppression to tamoxifen was associated with worse patient-reported outcomes in premenopausal women with...
In a phase II study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Taplin et al found that the addition of neoadjuvant abiraterone acetate (Zytiga) to the luteinizing hormone–releasing hormone (LHRH) agonist leuprolide acetate resulted in greater suppression of intraprostatic androgens in...
Olaparib, an experimental twice-daily oral cancer drug, produced an overall tumor response rate of 26% in several advanced cancers associated with BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutations, according to a phase II study reported by Kaufman et al in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. The positive response provides...
In the next 15 years, more than 1 in 10 colon cancers and nearly 1 in 4 rectal cancers will be diagnosed in patients younger than the traditional screening age, according to researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. This growing public health problem is underscored by data...
In the phase III Cancer and Leukemia Group B (CALGB) 40302/Alliance trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Burstein et al found that the addition of the dual EGFR-HER2 inhibitor lapatinib (Tykerb) to endocrine therapy with fulvestrant (Faslodex) did not improve progression-free...
In a prospective Chinese study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Seto et al found a 2-year rate of hepatitis B virus (HBV) reactivation of 41.5% in hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg)-negative and anti–hepatitis B core antigen antibody (anti-HBc)–positive patients receiving...
In a noninferiority phase III EORTC 10981-22023 AMAROS trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Donker et al found that axillary radiotherapy provided comparable disease control and was associated with less morbidity compared with axillary surgery in breast cancer patients with a positive sentinel...
Pain is a common symptom of cancer and side effect of cancer treatment, and treating cancer-related pain is often a challenge for health-care providers. The Penny George Institute for Health and Healing researchers found that integrative medicine therapies can substantially decrease pain and...
In a report from the Childhood Cancer Survivor Study published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Jones and colleagues found that vigorous exercise reduces the risk of major cardiovascular events in adult survivors of childhood Hodgkin lymphoma. Study Details In the study, 1,187 survivors of...
In a secondary analysis utilizing the graded prognostic assessment—an improved diagnosis-specific index—the group of all patients with one to three brain metastases had no survival advantage when treated with whole-brain radiation therapy and stereotactic radiosurgery, compared with...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Friedman and colleagues, the Children’s Oncology Group study AHOD0031 has shown that early response to dose-intensive chemotherapy can be used to tailor subsequent therapy in pediatric intermediate-risk Hodgkin lymphoma. Study Details In...
Patients with untreated metastatic colorectal cancer who received FOLFOXIRI (fluorouracil [5-FU], leucovorin, oxaliplatin, irinotecan) plus bevacizumab (Avastin) had improved survival compared to patients who received FOLFIRI (5-FU, leucovorin, irinotecan) plus bevacizumab in a phase III...
In a Danish population-based cohort study reported in Journal of Clinical Oncology, Daugaard and colleagues found that surveillance for stage I nonseminoma testicular cancer after orchiectomy was associated with high cure rate and low treatment burden over long-term follow-up. Study Details The...
Despite evidence that cervical cancer screening saves lives, about 8 million women aged 21 to 65 years have not been screened for cervical cancer in the past 5 years, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published in Morbidity and Mortality Weekly ...
There has been a dramatic increase in the use of laparoscopic colectomy for colon cancer. In a Medicare data study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Reames and colleagues found that use of laparoscopic colectomy varied from 0% to 66.8% across hospital referral regions in the United...
Intergroup Rhabdomyosarcoma Study Group (IRSG) studies have shown improved failure-free survival with VAC (vincristine, dactinomycin, and cyclophosphamide) given with a total cumulative cyclophosphamide dose of 26.4 g/m2 compared with VA (vincristine and dactinomycin) in patients with subset 1...
In a retrospective analysis utilizing both uterine serous carcinoma cell lines and patient-derived xenografts, dual therapy with lapatinib (Tykerb) and trastuzumab (Herceptin) demonstrated antitumor responses, according to a study by Groeneweg et al in Clinical Cancer Research. Also, the authors...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) today approved ramucirumab (Cyramza) for use in combination with paclitaxel for the treatment of patients with advanced gastric or gastroesophageal junction adenocarcinoma. Ramucirumab was approved in April 2014 as a single agent for the treatment of...
More than 80% of breast cancer patients in the United States use complementary therapies following a breast cancer diagnosis, but there has been little science-based guidance to inform clinicians and patients about their safety and effectiveness. In newly published clinical practice guidelines...
Adjuvant radiotherapy may play a role in the management of ovarian clear cell adenocarcinoma, which appears to be less prone to peritoneal dissemination than other subtypes, according to the results of a small retrospective study reported by Macrie et al in the International Journal of...
A randomized clinical trial of patients with advanced metastatic melanoma treated with ipilimumab (Yervoy), an immune checkpoint inhibitor, in combination with sargramostim (Leukine), an immune stimulant, vs ipilimumab alone, has found a 1-year survival rate of 68.9% vs 52.9% in the ipilimumab-only ...
In a phase III trial reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Long and colleagues found that the combination of the BRAF inhibitor dabrafenib (Tafinlar) and the MEK inhibitor trametinib (Mekinist) improved response rate and progression-free survival compared with dabrafenib alone in...
In a phase III trial reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Larkin and colleagues found that the combination of the BRAF inhibitor vemurafenib (Zelboraf) and the MEK inhibitor cobimetinib improved response rate and progression-free survival compared with vemurafenib alone in...
In an Italian study (Cancer-DACUS) reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Napolitano et al found that patients with no residual vein thrombosis after 6 months of low–molecular weight heparin for a first episode of cancer-related deep-vein thrombosis of the lower limbs had low risk for...
The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) today issued an endorsement of the American Urological Association (AUA)/American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO) guideline on the use of adjuvant and salvage radiotherapy after prostatectomy, which was based on a systematic review of medical...
In a study reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Shaw et al found that crizotinib (Xalkori) produced a high response rate in patients with ROS1-rearranged non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Chromosomal rearrangements in ROS1, which encodes the proto-oncogene receptor tyrosine...
In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Chow and colleagues developed risk scoring that can identify likelihood of heart failure among childhood cancer survivors. Study Details The study involved survivors in the Childhood Cancer Survivor Study (CCSS) free of significant...
In patients with ductal carcinoma in situ of the breast who underwent breast-conserving surgery, hypofractionated radiation therapy was not significantly associated with an increased risk of any local recurrence when compared with conventional radiation therapy, according to the study findings...
Scientists investigating the molecular mechanism of the protein p16 in cisplatin-treated head and neck cancer cells have found that the drug is able to kill the malignant cells by interacting with the protein gigaxonin. Although p16 is commonly produced in human papillomavirus (HPV)-positive...
Cancer is an unwanted experiment in progress. As the disease advances, tumor cells accumulate mutations, eventually arriving at ones that give them the insidious power to grow uncontrollably and spread. Distinguishing drivers of cancer from benign mutations open opportunities for developing...
In the NCIC-CTG LY.12 study, a phase III international noninferiority trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Crump and colleagues found that gemcitabine, dexamethasone, and cisplatin (GDP) was associated with a noninferior response rate and similar transplantation rate compared with...
In a French analysis reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Bonastre and colleagues found that use of the 70-gene signature (MammaPrint) was unlikely to be cost-effective in deciding whether to administer adjuvant therapy in patients with node-negative breast cancer. Use of Adjuvant! Online...
Analysis of data from an institutional patient registry on stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) indicates excellent long-term, local control in 79% of tumors for medically inoperable, early-stage lung cancer patients treated with the procedure from 2003 to 2012, according to research presented at...
Patients who received postoperative radiation therapy lived an average of 4 months longer when compared to the patients who had the same disease site, tumor histology, and treatment criteria and who did not receive postoperative radiotherapy, according to research presented at the 2014 Chicago ...
Even before the next Congress is formally elected, a national group of health-care stakeholders called the Cancer Innovation Coalition (CIC) went to Capitol Hill today to call for early legislative and regulatory action in 2015 that will reinvigorate cancer innovation in the United States. The...
The Dutch and Belgian NELSON trial is assessing the effect of increasing interval low-dose computed tomography (CT) screening for lung cancer on lung cancer mortality. In an analysis among screened Dutch participants reported in Lancet Oncology, Horeweg and colleagues identified screen-detected...
The Dutch and Belgian NELSON trial is assessing the effect of increasing interval low-dose computed tomography (CT) screening for lung cancer on lung cancer mortality. In an analysis of screening test performance among Dutch participants reported in Lancet Oncology, Horeweg and colleagues found...
Analysis of 607 small cell lung cancer (SCLC) tumors and neuroendocrine tumors identified common molecular markers among both groups that could reveal new therapeutic targets for patients with similar types of lung cancer, according to research presented at the 2014 Chicago Multidisciplinary...
Lung cancer patients with minimally invasive adenocarcinoma have similar, positive 5-year disease-free survival and overall survival rates as patients with adenocarcinoma in situ, according to research presented today at the 2014 Chicago Multidisciplinary Symposium in Thoracic Oncology (Abstract...
Biopsies were found to be the most costly tool prescribed in lung cancer diagnosis, according to research presented today at the 2014 Chicago Multidisciplinary Symposium in Thoracic Oncology (Abstract 103). The study examined the utilization rates and estimated the Medicare costs of the lung...
Patients at high-risk for developing lung cancer are more likely to receive low-dose computed tomography (CT) screening when their primary care provider is familiar with guideline recommendations for low-dose CT screening for lung cancer, according to research presented today at the 2014 Chicago...
Antibody-drug conjugates, checkpoint inhibitors, and single-dose intraoperative radiation therapy for breast cancer were included in the Cleveland Clinic's Ninth Annual Top 10 Medical Innovations List released earlier today. The list identifies those advances likely to have a major impact on...
The phase III ALSYMPCA trial showed that radium-223 (Xofigo) increased overall survival vs placebo patients with castration-resistant prostate cancer and symptomatic bone metastases. In a prespecified subgroup analysis reported in The Lancet Oncology, Hoskin et al found that overall survival...
Compared with normal colorectal mucosae, nearly half of colorectal tumors showed medium-to-high levels of lecithin retinol acyltransferase (LRAT) hypermethylation, according to the results of a study reported by Cheng et al in Medical Oncology. This finding was noted more frequent in earlier tumor...
New research by the international Cancer Genomics of the Kidney consortium (CAGEKID) reveals an important connection between kidney cancer and exposure to aristolochic acid, an ingredient in some herbal remedies. The findings, published by Scelo et al in Nature Communications, have important...
Data suggest that cancer treatment puts patients at risk of cognitive impairment and that many patients exhibit impairment prior to treatment. In an observational cohort study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Ganz et al found that language and communication cognitive complaints were...