Scientific and clinical pioneers have one thing in common: they move beyond their comfort zone and take calculated risks. One such pioneer, whose calculated risks gave hope to otherwise hopelessly ill people, was Thomas E. Starzl, MD, PhD, who performed the world’s first successful liver...
The incidence of colorectal cancer continues to increase among young adults, with the sharpest increase among those aged 20 to 29, according to a recent article in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.1 This trend has been called disturbing and ominous, but the widely reported results of...
At this year’s ASCO Quality Care Symposium, CancerLinQ’s Vice President and Medical Director, Robert S. Miller, MD, shed light on CancerLinQ’s current and future value in the oncology community.1 Dr. Miller opened by explaining to the audience that CancerLinQ™ is an instrument for quality...
Immunologic changes observed in an early study of patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (RCC) raised the possibility for a larger clinical study of combination immunotherapy, according to findings reported by researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. The results of...
In the phase II KEYNOTE-055 trial, pembrolizumab (Keytruda) was found to produce durable responses in patients with platinum- and cetuximab (Erbitux)-refractory head and neck squamous cell carcinoma. Results of the trial were reported by Bauml et al in the Journal of Clinical Oncology....
The adaptive phase II/III GATSBY trial has shown no survival difference between ado-trastuzumab emtansine (Kadcyla) vs taxane treatment in patients with previously treated locally advanced or metastatic gastric or gastroesophageal junction adenocarcinoma. Results were reported by Thuss-Patience et...
Adoptive T-cell therapy using “non-engineered” T cells has been showing activity in hematologic malignancies, according to a presentation by Ann M. Leen, PhD, at the 2017 ASCO-SITC Clinical Immuno-Oncology Symposium.1 Dr. Leen is an immunologist and works at the Center for Cell and Gene Therapy,...
Maintenance therapy with the tablet formulation of olaparib (Lynparza) significantly prolonged progression-free survival in patients with platinum-sensitive relapsed ovarian cancer and mutations in BRCA1/2 in the phase III SOLO2 trial, presented at the 2017 Society of Gynecologic Oncology (SGO)...
Treatment with the immune checkpoint inhibitor nivolumab (Opdivo) yielded durable responses in some patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), with a 5-year survival rate of 16%, according to data from a phase I clinical trial presented by Brahmer et al at the American...
In a phase III trial reported by Ascierto et al in The Lancet Oncology, treatment with ipilimumab (Yervoy) at 10 mg/kg vs 3 mg/kg resulted in improved overall survival in patients with advanced unresectable or metastatic melanoma. As noted by the investigators, although options for first-line...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Bardia et al, the anti–Trop-2 antibody drug conjugate sacituzumab govitecan has been found to produce durable responses in patients with heavily pretreated metastatic triple-negative breast cancer. Trop-2, a glycoprotein initially identified ...
Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center scientists report data from a new study providing evidence that random, unpredictable DNA copying “mistakes” account for nearly two-thirds of the mutations that cause cancer. Their research is grounded on a novel mathematic model based on DNA...
In the upcoming decades, the number of older adults with cancer will drastically increase due to aging of Western societies.1 The risk of cancer strongly increases with age. Consequently, all future oncologists will be exposed to the challenges of caring for this heterogeneous population. Older...
The ASCO Post’s Integrative Oncology series is intended to facilitate the availability of evidence-based information on integrative and complementary therapies commonly used by patients with cancer. In this installment, authors Jun J. Mao, MD, MSCE, and Jyothirmai Gubili, MS, present a case study...
The treatment of multiple myeloma is becoming increasingly complicated. This is not only because of the complexity of the disease, but also because of the increasing number of effective combination treatments and continuous development of new drugs. This has resulted in an ever-increasing number ...
In the phase III SWOG S0777 trial reported in The Lancet, Brian G.M. Durie, MD, of Cedars-Sinai Samuel Oschin Cancer Center, and colleagues found that adding bortezomib (Velcade) to lenalidomide (Revlimid)/dexamethasone improved progression-free and overall survival in patients with newly...
Anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK) rearrangements define a subset of non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients for whom ALK inhibitors are highly effective. In PROFILE 1014, the multitargeted ALK inhibitor crizotinib (Xalkori) was shown to be superior to platinum/pemetrexed (Alimta) chemotherapy...
In the phase III ASCEND-4 trial reported in The Lancet, Jean-Charles Soria, MD, of Institut Gustave Roussy, and colleagues found that ceritinib (Zykadia) improved progression-free survival vs platinum-based chemotherapy in the first-line treatment of advanced anaplastic lymphoma kinase...
Patients with follicular lymphoma are clearly living longer without disease progression, but what clinician has had no patients progress? Michael Auerbach, MD, a hematologist/oncologist in private practice in Baltimore and Clinical Professor of Medicine at Georgetown University, may have these...
The investigational small-molecule plinabulin yielded some interesting benefits when added to docetaxel in previously treated patients with stage III/IV non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), in a phase II study.1 Although the benefit of the doublet was modest in the overall study population, the...
When combined with chemotherapy, a vaccine against the human papillomavirus (HPV) type 16 potentiated T-cell responsiveness and improved clinical outcomes in patients with advanced cervical cancer enrolled in the phase I/II CervISA study.1 The findings were reported at the 2017 ASCO-SITC Clinical...
In patients with advanced hepatocellular carcinoma, treatment with nivolumab (Opdivo) resulted in responses and long-term survival in patients who were either previously treated or naive to sorafenib (Nexavar), CheckMate 040 has shown.1 Altogether 19% of patients responded to the antibody...
Patients receiving the antiviral letermovir (MK-8228, AIC246), as compared to placebo, were almost twice as likely to avoid infection with cytomegalovirus or fail for other reasons in a randomized phase III international trial presented at the 2017 BMT Tandem Meetings, the joint meeting of the...
The year 2016 was a memorable one for oncology. In January, President Barack Obama announced the launch of the National Cancer Moonshot initiative, spearheaded by Vice President Joe Biden, which aims to accelerate cancer research. And in December, through bipartisan Congressional support, the 21st ...
The prospective Delayed Intervention and Surveillance for Small Renal Masses (DISSRM) registry shows that over the intermediate term, active surveillance appears to be as safe as primary intervention for carefully selected, older, sicker patients with small renal masses.1 As the data mature,...
In a Japanese phase II trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Kudo et al found that nivolumab (Opdivo) had activity in heavily pretreated patients with advanced esophageal squamous cell carcinoma. Study Details In the study, with enrollment between February and November 2014, 65 patients...
In a press briefing today on Capitol Hill, ASCO presented its fourth annual State of Cancer Care in America: 2017 report, which found that although the cancer care delivery system in the United States is undergoing profound changes to better meet the needs of cancer survivors, persistent hurdles...
Patients in their 80s and 90s who have early-stage lung cancer but cannot undergo an operation can be treated safely and effectively with stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT), according to research presented by Cassidy et al at the 2017 Multidisciplinary Thoracic Cancers Symposium (Abstract...
Secondary endpoint results from the phase III ENGOT-OV16/NOVA trial of niraparib were presented at the 2017 Society for Gynecologic Oncology (SGO) Annual Meeting on Women's Cancer, by Sven Mahner, MD, Director, Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, University of Munich. “The results of...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved pembrolizumab (Keytruda), an anti–PD-1 (programmed cell death protein 1) therapy, for the treatment of adult and pediatric patients who have refractory classical Hodgkin lymphoma or have relapsed after three or more prior lines of...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Dhesy-Thind, ofJuravinski Cancer Centre, Hamilton Health Sciences, and colleagues, Cancer Care Ontario and ASCO have issued a clinical practice guideline on the use of adjuvant bisphosphonates and other bone-modifying agents in breast cancer. The...
In a large European cohort study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Smith Byrne et al found that vasectomy was not associated with an increased overall risk of prostate cancer or death from prostate cancer but appeared to increase the risk of lower-grade disease. Other studies have...
In the phase III TOWER trial reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Kantarjian et al found that blinatumomab (Blincyto) treatment improved overall survival vs chemotherapy in heavily pretreated patients with B-cell precursor acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). Blinatumomab received...
In the UK phase III LUNGSTAR study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Seckl et al found that adding pravastatin to first-line standard chemotherapy did not improve overall survival in patients with small cell lung cancer (SCLC). Numerous large prospective cohort and registry studies...
It’s no secret that cancer drug costs have skyrocketed out of control, with some treatments costing as much as $100,000 to $200,000 per year and even upward. This has put tremendous strain on the U.S. health-care system, while causing financial toxicity and bankruptcy for many patients. Peter B....
In the phase II extension component of the phase I/II AURA trial, reported by Yang et al in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, osimertinib (Tagrisso) was found to be highly active in epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) tyrosine kinase inhibitor–pretreated T790M-positive advanced...
Cervical cancer mortality rates were significantly higher, particularly among black women, when national data were corrected to exclude women who have had hysterectomies. For black women, the cervical cancer mortality rate rose from 5.7 to 10.1 per 100,000 when corrected for hysterectomy, an...
As reported by Elizabeth R. Plimack, MD, of Fox Chase Cancer Center, Temple Health, and colleagues in The Lancet Oncology, pembrolizumab (Keytruda) has shown activity in patients in the locally advanced or metastatic urothelial carcinoma cohort included in the phase Ib KEYNOTE-012 trial. In the...
Speaking at the 2016 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition, before the hold on pacritinib was lifted (in January 2017), Selina Luger, MD, of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, commented, “I think the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) needs to revisit ...
The investigational drug pacritinib met the primary endpoint of the phase III PERSIST-2 trial in high-risk patients with myelofibrosis and thrombocytopenia. Treatment with the Janus kinase (JAK)1/2 inhibitor pacritinib achieved a significant reduction in spleen volume compared with best available...
Three invited discussants explored the results of these recent immunotherapy studies in lung cancer as well as their potential clinical implications at the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer 17th World Conference on Lung Cancer. KEYNOTE-021 trial “Pembrolizumab (Keytruda) is...
An older trial designed to evaluate the benefits of adjuvant therapy following radical prostatectomy in patients with high-risk prostate cancer showed no difference in overall or disease-free survival between 2 years of androgen-deprivation therapy and 2 years of androgen-deprivation therapy plus...
Human papillomavirus (HPV) is the most common sexually transmitted infection worldwide. It affects 80% of individuals, with the initial infection usually occurring between the ages of 15 and 24. Persistent infection with oncogenic HPV genotypes, primarily 16 and 18, is the cause of virtually all...
In 1995, Matthew Zachary, an aspiring concert pianist and composer, was en route to graduate school to study film composition when he lost all fine-motor coordination in his left hand, was diagnosed with pediatric brain cancer (medulloblastoma), told he would never play again, and was given 6...
In a prospective cohort study reported in JAMA, Rugo et al found that use of a scalp-cooling device reduced hair loss in women receiving nonanthracycline chemotherapy for early-stage breast cancer. Study Details In the study, 101 evaluable patients from 5 U.S. centers with stage I or II breast...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Borchmann et al, a phase III German Hodgkin Study Group trial in advanced Hodgkin lymphoma showed no progression-free survival benefit of adding rituximab (Rituxan) in patients with positive positron-emission tomography (PET) findings after two courses (PET-2)...
Adding two blood-borne proteins associated with cancer cell migration increases the predictive ability of the current biomarker for pancreatic cancer to detect early-stage disease, a research team from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center reported in a study by Balasenthil et al in the ...
In a phase III KEYNOTE-045 trial reported in The New England Journal of Medicine, Bellmunt et al found that pembrolizumab (Keytruda) significantly improved overall survival vs investigator choice of chemotherapy as second-line treatment in patients with advanced urothelial cancer whose disease...
In 1978, Charles A. “Mickey” LeMaistre, MD, was named President of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. During his 18-year tenure, MD Anderson became a world leader in outpatient care for cancer patients and the nation’s largest ambulatory treatment and surgery programs in cancers....
Scientific Name: Glycine max Common Names: Soybean, soya, tofu, miso, tempeh Overview An annual herb indigenous to East Asia, soy was domesticated more than 3,000 years ago for its pods and edible seeds. It is now the world’s most important legume crop and is grown in diverse climates. Foods...