The availability of cross-sectional imaging has resulted in increased diagnosis of low-grade pancreatic neoplasms and use of central pancreatectomy as an alternative to standard resection for such lesions. In a French single-center experience reported in JAMA Surgery, Goudard et al found that...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by O’Connell et al, the National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Project (NSABP) Trial R-04 is assessing four chemotherapy regimens given concurrently with preoperative radiotherapy in order to help identify optimal treatment in patients with ...
According to a large study of Caucasian women investigating chronic sun exposure over long durations in adulthood and sun exposure in early life, those who had at least five blistering sunburns when they were 15 to 20 years old had a 68% increased risk for basal cell carcinoma and squamous cell...
In the noninferiority COREAN trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Jeong et al found that laparoscopic surgery was associated with disease-free survival similar to that with open surgery for mid- or low-rectal cancer. Study Details In this open-label trial, 340 patients with cT3N0–2M0...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved palonosetron hydrochloride (Aloxi) injection for the prevention of acute nausea and vomiting associated with initial and repeat courses of emetogenic cancer chemotherapy, including highly emetogenic cancer chemotherapy, in children aged 1...
In a study reported in JAMA Otolaryngology–Head & Neck Surgery, Rocke et al compared hypothetical resource allocation by otolaryngology–head and neck surgery physicians and patients with that by advanced cancer patients or their caregivers. They found significant differences in...
The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) has issued an update to its clinical practice guideline on the use of adjuvant endocrine therapy for women with stage I to III hormone receptor–positive breast cancer. The guideline was published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. Duration...
Gemcitabine plus a platinum agent is standard treatment in advanced biliary cancer. In the phase II open-label noncomparative BINGO trial, reported in The Lancet Oncology, Malka et al found no apparent benefit of adding the EGFR inhibitor cetuximab (Erbitux) to gemcitabine/oxaliplatin in first-line ...
Researchers have identified a mutated gene common to adenosquamous carcinoma tumors, the first known unique molecular signature for this rare, but particularly virulent, form of pancreatic cancer. The findings by Liu et al are published in Nature Medicine. Pancreatic cancer is the fourth leading...
In a recent study in Annals of Internal Medicine, Vater et al analyzed the content of 409 unique clinical advertisements on television and in magazines placed by 102 cancer centers in 2012. The researchers assessed each ad for types of clinical services promoted, information provided about...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved panitumumab (Vectibix) for use in combination with FOLFOX (fluorouracil, leucovorin, oxaliplatin) as first-line treatment in patients with wild-type KRAS (exon 2) metastatic colorectal cancer. This approval converts the accelerated...
In an open-label phase II trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Glass et al examined the strategy of adding rituximab (Rituxan) to standard prophylaxis for graft-vs-host disease after allogeneic stem cell transplantation in relapsed or refractory aggressive non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Rituximab did not...
A patient-centered educational and behavioral program focusing on self-care strategies appears to be an effective way to reduce the risk of lymphedema in survivors of breast cancer, according to the results of a prospective study by Fu et al at New York University. These findings, reported in the...
In a Japanese phase III trial (DELTA) reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Kawaguchi et al found that erlotinib (Tarceva) was associated with no progression-free survival or overall survival advantage as second- or third-line therapy in EGFR-unselected patients with non–small cell...
Although presence of circulating tumor cells has been shown to predict reduced survival in metastatic breast cancer, data on their predictive performance in earlier breast cancer are lacking. In a study reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Rack et al found that presence of...
The addition of sorafenib (Nexavar) to yttrium-90 radioembolization was associated with higher rates of biliary complications and potentially more acute rejections prior to transplantation in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma, according to the results of a prospective randomized pilot study....
In a meta-analysis reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Pettersson et al found that percentage dense area on breast mammography is a stronger predictor of breast cancer than absolute dense area. An inverse association of absolute nondense area and risk was also observed. The...
Current treatment options for relapsed/refractory acute myeloid leukemia (AML), which carries a very poor prognosis, are generally ineffective. In a phase III trial (CLAVELA) reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Roboz et al found that elacytarabine, a novel elaidic acid ester of...
Patients deciding to undergo contralateral prophylactic mastectomy as part of initial treatment for breast cancer is a growing challenge in the management of the disease. Removing the unaffected breast has not been shown to increase survival, and the more aggressive procedure is associated with...
Lenalidomide (Revlimid) is active in relapsed or refractory aggressive B-cell lymphomas. In a European phase II trial (REAL07) reported in The Lancet Oncology, Vitolo et al examined the addition of lenalidomide to rituximab (Rituxan), cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, vincristine, and prednisolone...
Fibrous tissue long suspected of making pancreatic cancer worse actually supports an immune attack that slows tumor progression but cannot overcome it, scientists at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center reported in the journal Cancer Cell. “This supportive tissue that’s...
In a letter to The New England Journal of Medicine, Zhu et al described identification of resistance mutations in acute promyelocytic leukemia patients receiving arsenic trioxide (Trisenox) and all-trans retinoic acid (ATRA) therapy. The direct-binding targets of arsenic trioxide in the...
There are conflicting data on whether epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) inhibitor therapy is beneficial in second-line treatment of lung cancer patients with unknown or wild-type EGFR status. In a phase III trial (PROSE) reported in The Lancet Oncology, Gregorc et al assessed the predictive...
The cancer community is mourning the death of Selma Schimmel who passed away on May 21, 2014, from malignant psoas syndrome, a complication of ovarian cancer. Ms. Schimmel died at Providence Tarzana Medical Center near her home in Los Angeles, California. She was 59. A tireless and fierce advocate ...
In a recent study by the Lung Cancer Mutation Consortium (LCMC), investigators incorporated tumor genotyping into therapeutic decision-making for patients with lung adenocarcinomas. An oncogenic driver was detected in 64% of tumors from patients in this study. According to data from this study...
According to a new study by researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, selection of men for active surveillance for prostate cancer should be based not on conventional biopsy, but on a new, imaging-guided targeted prostate biopsy. The new biopsy method is now a routine part of the...
In a study reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Kaseb et al developed a plasma insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1)–based score for hepatic reserve in hepatocellular carcinoma and compared its predictive ability with that of the Child-Turcotte-Pugh (CTP) score in two...
Epithelial-mesenchymal transition plays a key role in tumor cell invasion, metastasis, and drug resistance and the transcription factor brachyury has recently been identified as a driver of this process. In a study reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Palena et al found that a...
In a phase III trial (CA184-043) reported in The Lancet Oncology, Kwon et al assessed the effects of adding ipilimumab (Yervoy) after radiotherapy in patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer progressing after docetaxel chemotherapy. The investigators found no improvement...
One of the first studies to analyze the effectiveness of screening survivors of childhood cancer for early signs of impending congestive heart failure found improved health outcomes but suggested that less frequent screening than currently recommended may yield similar clinical benefit. Researchers ...
A proposed metric of quality of cancer care is whether chemotherapy is administered in the last 14 days of life. In a retrospective study of patients at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center reported in JAMA Internal Medicine, Rodriguez et al found an overall rate of chemotherapy use in ...
In an article in The Lancet Oncology, Sartor et al report symptomatic skeletal event outcomes in the phase III ALSYMPCA trial, which was the study supporting the May 2013 approval of radium-233 dichloride (Xofigo) in patients with castration-resistant prostate cancer and bone metastases. They found ...
A randomized phase Ib study of a combination of low radiosensitizing doses of gemcitabine and fractionated doses of 90Y-clivatuzumab tetraxetan in patients with metastatic pancreatic ductal cancer who had received at least two prior systemic therapies, has found a significant survival advantage in...
A series of studies evaluating the cost-effectiveness, risks, and outcomes associated with detecting, diagnosing, and treating testicular cancer were presented at a press conference during the 2014 Annual Scientific Meeting of the American Urological Association in Orlando, Florida. Although...
According to the results from three studies published in European Urology, the 17-gene Oncotype DX Genomic Prostate Score is a significant predictor of disease aggressiveness at the time of diagnosis before intervention with radiation or surgery. The test provides more precise and individualized...
Two preclinical studies of tumor samples taken from 39 patients with pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors and 39 patients with pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma has found that for both these pancreatic cancers, CD47 is expressed at elevated levels on the cells that make up the bulk of the tumors and on...
In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Hung et al assessed the ability of the 2011 International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer/American Thoracic Society/European Respiratory Society (IASLC/ATS/ERS) adenocarcinoma classification system to predict disease recurrence and...
Although neoadjuvant cisplatin-based chemotherapy is standard of care for muscle-invasive bladder cancer, it is not widely used due to concerns over toxicity and delayed cystectomy. In a phase II trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Plimack et al evaluated whether a neoadjuvant...
In a phase II trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Choueiri et al found that a neoadjuvant four-cycle/8-week regimen of dose-dense methotrexate, vinblastine, doxorubicin, and cisplatin was well tolerated and effective in patients with muscle-invasive urothelial cancer. Study Details ...
Cervical cancer rates in the United States are higher than previously believed, particularly among 65- to 69-year-old women and African American women, according to a study by Rositch et al published in Cancer. Current U.S. cervical cancer screening guidelines do not recommend routine Pap smears...
The only recent comprehensive analysis of lung cancer rates for women around the world found that lung cancer rates are dropping in young women in many regions of the globe, pointing to the success of tobacco control efforts. However, rates continue to increase among older women in many countries,...
Retrospective studies have shown that pharmacologic thromboprophylaxis is underutilized in hospitalized patients with cancer, who are believed to be at high risk of venous thromboembolism. In a prospective cross-sectional study reported in Journal of Clinical Oncology, Zwicker et al found that...
Researchers investigating the effects of water pipe smoking on the health of young adults have found elevated levels of nicotine, cotinine, tobacco-related cancer-causing agents, and volatile organic compounds, including benzene and acrolein, in the urine of users. Given the significant intake of...
In the large phase III SQUIRE trial of necitumumab (IMC-11F8) in combination with gemcitabine and cisplatin in the first-line treatment of advanced squamous non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), patients with stage IV metastatic disease showed a statistically significant improvement in overall...
A new study of 80,000 women with early breast cancer in 70 clinical trials finds that obesity is associated with a 34% higher risk of breast cancer–related death only among the 20,000 premenopausal women who had estrogen receptor–positive disease. Obesity had little effect in...
A new model projects 5-year outcomes of implementing the recent U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) recommendations for annual low-dose computed tomography (CT) lung cancer screening in a high-risk Medicare population. The model estimates that gradual implementation of the screening...
According to early results from a phase I study, a new targeted drug, PLX3397, appears remarkably active against a rare neoplastic joint disorder known as pigmented villonodular synovitis. The study evaluated patients whose disease had progressed despite all other available therapies. More than...
Findings from a phase I study of a new mutant-selective epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) tyrosine kinase inhibitor, AZD9291, point to a promising new treatment option for patients with advanced, EGFR-mutant, non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) that is resistant to standard EGFR...
According to a large, population-based observational study of men who had a prostate-specific antigen (PSA)-only based relapse after prostate surgery or radiation therapy, delaying androgen deprivation therapy until the onset of symptoms or appearance of cancer on a scan does not substantially...
Researchers at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles have discovered that by targeting a particular receptor, chemotherapy-resistant cancer cells can be killed in an acute form of childhood leukemia, offering the potential for a future treatment for patients who would otherwise experience relapse...