HIV-infected people diagnosed with cancer are two to four times more likely to go untreated for their cancer compared to uninfected cancer patients, according to a large retrospective study from researchers in Penn Medicine’s Abramson Cancer Center and the National Cancer Institute (NCI). The ...
Hepatocyte growth factor (HGF) and its receptor MET have been found to promote the proliferation, migration, and survival of tumor cells and to play a role in gastric cancer. In a phase II study reported in The Lancet Oncology, Iveson et al found evidence of benefit from adding the anti-HGF...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has granted Breakthrough Therapy designation to blinatumomab for adults with Philadelphia chromosome–negative relapsed/refractory B-precursor acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), a rapidly progressing cancer of the blood and bone marrow....
Higher intakes of calcium, vitamin D, and dairy product are associated with lower risk of colorectal cancer, but the effect of such intake on survival in colorectal cancer is unclear. In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Yang et al found that higher postdiagnosis intake of...
Given the changes in treatment of children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), the risk of late effects in those treated with current protocols may be different from that in children treated decades ago. In a study of survivors of childhood standard-risk ALL reported in The Lancet Oncology,...
Surgical resection markedly improved survival among metastatic melanoma patients whose disease is isolated to a few areas in the liver, according to new study findings published in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons. These results mark a departure for melanoma, which is most often...
Although cancer immunotherapy with adoptive transfer of tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes represents an effective treatment for patients with metastatic melanoma, the antigen targets recognized by these effective tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes remain unclear. According to a new study, a novel...
The new combination agent TAS-102 can improve overall survival compared to placebo in patients whose metastatic colorectal cancer is refractory to standard therapies, researchers reported at the ESMO 16th World Congress on Gastrointestinal Cancer in Barcelona (Abstract O-0022). “Around 50%...
Obesity is associated with poorer outcome in women with operable breast cancer. In the LISA study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Goodwin et al found that a 24-month telephone-based intervention was effective in reducing body weight in postmenopausal breast cancer patients receiving...
A new evidence-based clinical practice guideline from the American College of Physicians (ACP) is recommending that physicians should not offer routine pelvic examinations to asymptomatic, average-risk, nonpregnant women. The recommendation stems from a review of 52 published articles from 1946...
Oncogenic mutations in GNAQ and GNA11, resulting in MAPK pathway activation, are observed in > 80% of uveal melanomas. In a phase II trial reported in JAMA, Carvajal et al found that treatment with the MEK1/MEK2 inhibitor selumetinib significantly prolonged progression-free survival vs...
Researchers found that three-dimensional (3D) mammography (also known as digital breast tomosynthesis) detected significantly more invasive cancers than a traditional mammogram alone and reduced call-backs for additional imaging. Published in JAMA, this is the largest study reported to...
In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Zhong et al assessed factors associated with use of immediate breast reconstruction after treatment or prophylaxis for breast cancer among women in the Canadian universal health-care system. Immediate breast reconstruction was more likely in...
In a UK phase III TeloVac trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Middleton et al found that the sequential or concurrent addition of the telomerase peptide vaccine GV1001 to gemcitabine/capecitabine did not improve survival in patients with locally advanced or metastatic pancreatic cancer. GV1001...
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is likely to improve insurance coverage for young adults. In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Aizer et al examined the association between insurance status and cancer outcomes among young adults, finding that the uninsured...
Patients with human papillomavirus (HPV)-positive oropharyngeal cancer have reduced risk of progression compared with those with HPV-negative disease, but the effect of HPV status on overall survival after progression has not been clear. In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology,...
The addition of the novel agent MM-398 to standard treatment improved overall survival in patients with metastatic pancreatic cancer who have already received gemcitabine, according to a phase III trial reported at the ESMO 16th World Congress on Gastrointestinal Cancer in Barcelona (Abstract...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee (ODAC) voted 11 to 2 that current evidence from clinical studies does not support an accelerated approval for use of olaparib as a maintenance treatment for women with platinum-sensitive relapsed ovarian cancer who have...
In an interim analysis of the European phase III PETACC-8 trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Taieb et al found no disease-free survival or overall survival benefit with the addition of cetuximab (Erbitux) to standard adjuvant FOLFOX4 (oxaliplatin, fluorouracil, leucovorin) therapy in patients...
St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital announced the appointment of James R. Downing, MD, as its new CEO, effective July 15, 2014. Dr. Downing most recently has served as the Deputy Director, Executive Vice President and Scientific Director of the hospital. He succeeds William E. Evans,...
In a systematic review and meta-analysis reported in Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Templeton et al found that high neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio, a marker of inflammation, is associated with significantly poorer overall survival in solid tumors overall and by individual category. High...
Researchers from Case Western Reserve and Dartmouth have shown that a class of small antioxidant molecules carries promise for suppressing colon cancer associated with colitis. These preclinical findings, published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, offer hope that physicians ultimately will ...
In a UK phase III trial (UKALL 2003) reported in The Lancet Oncology, Vora et al found that augmented postremission therapy provided an event-free survival benefit at the cost of increased toxicity in children and young adults with clinical standard- or intermediate-risk but minimal residual...
The oral fluoropyrimidine S-1 is standard treatment for locally advanced gastric cancer in Japan. In a Japanese phase III trial (SAMIT) in locally advanced disease reported in The Lancet Oncology, Tsuburaya et al found that sequential paclitaxel plus tegafur and uracil or S-1 did not improve...
Men and women who took low-dose aspirin regularly had a 48% reduction in their risk of developing pancreatic cancer, according to a new study. In addition, the longer a person started taking low-dose aspirin, the greater the benefit, ranging from 48% reduction in people who started 3 years before...
In what may be the first randomized trial of systemic therapy in this setting, Dutton and colleagues evaluated gefitinib (Iressa) vs placebo in patients with esophageal cancer progressing after chemotherapy. As reported in The Lancet Oncology, the COG trial showed no survival benefit with gefitinib ...
Bisphenol A (BPA), a chemical commonly used in plastics, appears to increase the proliferation of breast cancer cells, according to Duke Medicine researchers presenting at ICE/ENDO 2014, the annual joint meeting of the International Society of Endocrinology and the Endocrine Society in Chicago. The ...
In a Japanese study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Fujimori et al found that an oncologist communication skills training program based on patient preferences in receiving bad news was of benefit to both oncologists and patients. Study Details In the study, 30 oncologists were...
Tumor microenvironment of metastasis (TMEM) consists of direct contact between a macrophage, an endothelial cell, and a tumor cell. In a case-control study reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Rohan et al found that TMEM score was an independent predictor of distant metastasis...
Trebananib inhibits angiogenesis by blocking the binding of angiopoietins 1 and 2 to the Tie2 receptor expressed on endothelial cells, a mechanism that differs from VEGF inhibitors and that involves a different signaling pathway. In the phase III TRINOVA-1 trial reported in The Lancet Oncology,...
A new study found that an imaging technique called multiparametric 18fluorodeoxyglucose positron-emission tomography magnetic resonance imaging (18FDG PET-MRI), which combines four imaging approaches, can better distinguish malignant breast tumors from those that are benign, compared with imaging...
Despite some success in treating patients with Hodgkin lymphoma, many patients may experience late effects of radiation therapy and chemotherapy treatment, including the possible onset of breast cancer or heart disease. A study by Hoppe et al from the University of Florida Proton Therapy Institute...
In an online report in the journal Cancer, a team of University of Chicago cancer specialists have described the first tool—11 questions, assembled and refined from conversations with more than 150 patients with advanced cancer—to measure a patient’s risk for, and ability to...
Extended colectomy in patients with sporadic colorectal cancer who were younger than age 50, in comparison with segmental resection, did not improve the risk of tumor recurrence or disease-free survival, according to the results of a retrospective study presented by Klos et al in the Journal of...
In a study reported in Journal of Clinical Oncology, Azambuja et al found low rates of trastuzumab (Herceptin)-related cardiac dysfunction over a median of 8 years of follow-up in the HERceptin Adjuvant (HERA) trial. The majority of patients with cardiac dysfunction achieved acute recovery. Study...
In a study of the association of thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH), thyroglobulin, and thyroid hormones with risk of differentiated thyroid cancer reported in Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Rinaldi et al found that high thyroglobulin levels can precede thyroid cancer by many years and...
Takeda Pharmaceutical Company Limited announced today that it has voluntarily decided to end the development program for orteronel (TAK-700), an investigational oral, nonsteroidal, selective inhibitor of 17,20-lyase, for prostate cancer. The decision follows the results of two phase III...
A study by Black et al from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, found that the use of sentinel lymph node biopsy to stage early breast cancer increased in both black and white women from 2002 to 2007, but the rates remained lower in black than white patients, a disparity...
New research published online in Blood suggests that the diversity of bacteria in the gastrointestinal tract of patients receiving stem cell transplants may be an important predictor of their post-transplant survival. Potential Connections Previous studies have shown that the intensive treatment...
A “reasonable” delay prior to surgery for colon cancer may not result in worse outcomes, according to the results of a retrospective study presented by Amri et al in the Annals of Surgical Oncology. Flexibility in scheduling surgery may lead to an improvement in the quality and safety...
Used as a conditioning regimen for allogeneic transplantation in patients with acute leukemia, reduced-intensity total-body irradiation yielded similar overall and relapse-free survival rates to those seen with myeloablative total-body irradiation but with shorter hospital stays and fewer intensive ...
Researchers at the University of California, San Diego, School of Medicine have completed the first comprehensive survey of e-cigarettes for sale online, and the results, they believe, underscore the complexity in regulating the rapidly growing market for the electronic nicotine delivery devices....
In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Pollack et al found antigen-specific immune responses and evidence of clinical activity with glioma-associated antigen (GAA) peptide vaccination in children with newly diagnosed malignant brainstem and nonbrainstem gliomas. Study Details In ...
In a European study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Moreau et al developed and validated a combined index for prognosis in patients with multiple myeloma treated with front-line autologous stem cell transplantation. The index, consisting of high lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) level,...
Prone accelerated intensity-modulated radiation therapy with a concomitant boost produced excellent local tumor control and cosmesis while sparing normal tissues in women with early-stage breast cancer, according to the 5-year study results reported by Osa et al in the International Journal of...
Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma is considered a “nonimmunogenic” neoplasm and does not typically respond to immunotherapy, in part due to a complex tumor microenvironment that provides a formidable barrier to immune infiltration and function. A new study by Lutz et al has found that by ...
A study by researchers from Danbury Hospital Biomedical Research Institute in Connecticut has found that patients with ovarian cancer who relapse shortly after neoadjuvant chemotherapy to shrink their tumor prior to surgery have high levels of expression of HGF and c-Met proteins. The...
A small study of 18 patients with breast cancer treated with chemotherapy has found a significant increase in cognitive complaints and significant correlations between these increases and decreases in multitasking-related brain activation. The study by Deprez et al is published in the Journal of...
A study reported in JAMA Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery by VanderWalde and colleagues suggests that increasing use of positron emission tomography (PET) for diagnosis and staging of head and neck cancer has resulted in considerable stage migration characterized by dilution of higher stages...
A unique public-private collaboration among the National Cancer Institute (NCI), SWOG Cancer Research, Friends of Cancer Research, the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health (FNIH), five pharmaceutical companies (Amgen, Genentech, Pfizer, AstraZeneca, and AstraZeneca’s global...