In a study (ABCD; Alleviating Breathlessness in Cancer Patients with Dexamethasone) reported in The Lancet Oncology, David Hui, MD, MS, MSc, and colleagues found that high-dose dexamethasone did not improve dyspnea compared with placebo in patients with cancer and was associated with greater...
State-run Medicaid insurance, expanded in 2014 as part of the Affordable Care Act, has resulted in decreased metastatic cancer incidence rates as well as decreased overall cancer mortality rates, and has averted over 1,000 deaths due to cancer per year. About 12% of the improvements in cancer...
A cancer navigation program can reduce overall costs when deployed in collaboration with a statewide Medicare Advantage health plan across a wide range of practice types, according to findings to be presented by Worland et al at the upcoming 2022 ASCO Quality Care Symposium (Abstract 4). A...
Substituting biosimilars, generics, and clinically appropriate lower-cost drugs for established, costlier drugs was shown to be an effective way to reduce the total cost of care, by 5% or so, while maintaining the quality of care for patients with cancer. Even small shifts toward lower-cost drugs...
In this installment of the Living a Full Life series, Guest Editor Jame Abraham, MD, FACP, spoke with Stanton (“Stan”) L. Gerson, MD, Dean and Senior Vice President for Medical Affairs, School of Medicine, and Acting Director of the Case Comprehensive Cancer Center and National Center for...
Guest Editor’s Note: Several studies have shown that regular physical activity helps to reduce the symptom burden and improve disease-related outcomes in patients with cancer. In this article, Jessica M. Scott, PhD, and Neil M. Iyengar, MD, summarize the current evidence surrounding exercise...
Despite a significant potential for cure, relapsed and refractory large B-cell lymphomas (LBCL) comprise the most common cause of lymphoma-related mortality. Sequential relapses reflect the limits of repeated exposure to chemotherapy, even when delivered at high doses. More than 30 years ago,...
ASCO and the Association of Community Cancer Centers (ACCC) jointly released two resources to help research sites increase racial and ethnic equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) in cancer clinical trials. The Just ASK™ Increasing Diversity in Cancer Clinical Research: An ACCC-ASCO Training...
The incorporation of blood-based measurements—ie, “liquid biopsies”—into imaging assessment may refine the accuracy of prognosis in aggressive lymphomas, as described by David Kurtz, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor in the Division of Oncology, Stanford University Medical Center, in a talk at the 2022...
Discussant of the exploratory analysis of the POSEIDON trial, Chia Puey Ling, MBBS, MMed, MRCP, FRACP, PhD, a medical oncologist at Tan Tock Seng Hospital, Singapore, noted that although 30% of the mutation-evaluable population had KRAS mutations, only a small percentage of patients had co-mutated...
As reported in The New England Journal of Medicine by Frederick L. Locke, MD, of the Department of Blood and Marrow Transplant and Cellular Immunotherapy, H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center, Tampa, Florida, and colleagues, the phase III ZUMA-7 trial in large B-cell lymphoma has shown improved event-free...
The addition of the CTLA-4 inhibitor tremelimumab to durvalumab and chemotherapy in the first-line setting has already demonstrated an overall survival and progression-free survival benefit vs chemotherapy alone in patients with metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). According to data...
Globally, the population is aging, with the number of people aged 60 and older projected to double from 1 billion worldwide in 2020 to 2.1 billion by 2050. Given the aging population, coupled with the risk of cancer increasing with age, an exponential rise in cases of older adults diagnosed with...
From microchips to automobiles, people in the United States are experiencing shortages of all kinds of products, and oncology treatments are no exception. In particular, shortages related to chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy have been reported, most acutely, for B-cell maturation...
On August 11, 2022, fam-trastuzumab deruxtecan-nxki was granted accelerated approval for unresectable or metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with tumors that have activating HER2 mutations, as detected by a U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved test and who have received a...
The American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) has announced Loïc Le Marchand, MD, PhD, MPH, as the recipient of the 2022 AACR Distinguished Lectureship on the Science of Cancer Health Disparities. Dr. Le Marchand presented his award lecture, “Translating Multiethnic Epidemiological Research...
On August 10, 2022, capmatinib was granted regular approval for patients with metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with tumors having a mutation leading to mesenchymal-epithelial transition (MET) exon 14 skipping, as detected by a U.S. Food and Drug Administration–approved test.1...
The European Society For Medical Oncology (ESMO) launched its annual congress, held September 9–13, 2022, just as this issue of The ASCO Post was going to press. Watch upcoming issues for comprehensive coverage of the live congress, following 2 years of virtual meetings and remote presentations due ...
Abstract discussant Anand Devaraj, MD, PhD, a thoracic radiologist at Royal Brompton and Harefield hospitals, and Professor of Thoracic Radiology at the National Heart and Lung Institute, Imperial College London, noted that both the Nederlands-Leuvens Longkanker Screenings Onderzoek (NELSON) trial...
Lung cancer screening has been shown to significantly reduce lung cancer mortality, but some management protocols have more benefit than others, according to data presented at the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer 2022 World Conference on Lung Cancer (WCLC).1 Although the...
Discussant of the IMpower010 abstract, Benjamin Besse, MD, PhD, Professor and Head of Clinical Research at Institute Gustave Roussy, Villejuif, France, said there is enough evidence to use adjuvant immunotherapy in stage II–IIIA resected non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), calling the increased...
Early results from the IMpower010 trial showed an overall survival trend favoring adjuvant atezolizumab vs best supportive care for patients with PD-L1–positive (tumor expression ≥ 1%), stage II–IIIA (UICC/AJCC staging system, 7th ed), resected non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). These data were...
On June 24, 2022, the Supreme Court ruled in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization (Dobbs)1 and overturned Roe v Wade and Planned Parenthood v Casey, which recognized a federal constitutional right to end a pregnancy up to the point of viability. This decision opened the door for states to...
Abstract discussant Kara N. Maxwell, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor of Medicine and Genetics at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, highlighted evidence showing that some lung cancer is inherited. The Nordic Twin Study identified an 18% heritability of lung cancer, she said,...
Germline testing may be warranted for all patients with lung cancer, according to research presented during the August 2022 ASCO Plenary Series by Renato G. Martins, MD, MPH, Chair of Hematology Oncology and Palliative Care at Virginia Commonwealth University Massey Cancer Center, Richmond.1 The...
The first discussant of the NADIM II study, Corinne Faivre-Finn, MD, PhD, Professor of Thoracic Radiation Oncology, University of Manchester, and Honorary Consultant Clinical Oncologist at The Christie NHS Foundation Trust, Manchester, England, called the results “very impressive” but noted that...
In patients with resectable, stage IIIA non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), the addition of neoadjuvant nivolumab to platinum-based chemotherapy significantly improved overall survival compared with neoadjuvant chemotherapy alone, according to data presented by Mariano Provencio, MD, PhD, at the...
Advances in more effective treatment and early detection diagnostics, coupled with reductions in smoking rates, have resulted in a 32% decline in cancer mortality in the United States since 1991, translating into nearly 3.5 million lives saved, according to the newly released American Association...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Vivek Subbiah, MD, and colleagues, the phase I/II LIBRETTO-001 basket trial has shown that the RET kinase inhibitor selpercatinib demonstrated activity in patients with RET fusion–positive solid tumors in an analysis excluding lung and thyroid cancers. Findings ...
September 24 is World Cancer Research Day, an initiative organized by a collaboration of professional societies, research organizations, and other institutions. In advance of the event, the following declaration was published in order to outline the goals of the initiative: Cancer is projected to...
In a Chinese phase III trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Zhang et al found that conditioning with busulfan plus cyclophosphamide (BuCy) was noninferior to total-body irradiation plus cyclophosphamide (TBI-Cy) in 2-year overall survival among adult patients with standard-risk...
Three-quarters of surveyed people preferred to do a fecal immunochemical test (FIT) rather than undergo a colonoscopy for their regular colorectal cancer screening, according to a new Cedars-Sinai study published by Makaroff et al in Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology. “One of the big issues...
Physical activity may be associated with improved outcomes for patients undergoing postoperative treatment for stage III colon cancer, according to findings from a new study out of Pennington Biomedical Research Center published by Brown et al in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. The study assessed ...
New, long-term use of opioids after lung cancer surgery was linked to a 40% increased risk of death from any cause within the following 2 years, according to findings published by Oh et al in the journal Regional Anesthesia & Pain Medicine. Persistent postoperative pain has been reported in up...
This is Part 4 of Updates in Colorectal Cancer, a four-part video roundtable series. Scroll down to watch the other videos from this Roundtable. In this video, Drs. Cathy Eng, Arvind Dasari, and Smitha Krishnamurthi discuss the management of microsatellite instability (MSI)-high rectal...
This is Part 3 of Updates in Colorectal Cancer, a four-part video roundtable series. Scroll down to watch the other videos from this Roundtable. In this video, Drs. Cathy Eng, Arvind Dasari, and Smitha Krishnamurthi discuss the management of HER2-positive colorectal cancer. The patient is a...
This is Part 2 of Updates in Colorectal Cancer, a four-part video roundtable series. Scroll down to watch the other videos from this Roundtable. In this video, Drs. Cathy Eng, Arvind Dasari, and Smitha Krishnamurthi discuss the role of neoadjuvant therapy in T4 colon cancer. The patient a...
This is Part 1 of Updates in Colorectal Cancer, a four-part video roundtable series. Scroll down to watch the other videos from this Roundtable. In this video, Drs. Cathy Eng, Arvind Dasari, and Smitha Krishnamurthi discuss the role of circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) in early-stage colon cancer....
Nizar M. Tannir, MD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses phase III findings from the PIVOT-09 study, which compared bempegaldesleukin plus nivolumab with the investigator’s choice of a tyrosine kinase inhibitor (either sunitinib or cabozantinib) in patients with...
In a phase III trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Janos L. Tanyi, MD, PhD, and colleagues found that use of pafolacianine infusion for intraoperative imaging improved the detection of lesions in patients with folate receptor–positive ovarian cancer, compared with using white light...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by O’Brien et al, the second interim analysis of the phase III PEARLS/KEYNOTE-091 trial has shown significantly improved disease-free survival with adjuvant pembrolizumab vs placebo in patients with completely resected stage IB to IIIA non-small cell lung cancer...
On September 21, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted accelerated approval to selpercatinib (Retevmo) for adult patients with locally advanced or metastatic solid tumors with a rearranged during transfection (RET) gene fusion and disease progression on or following prior systemic...
On September 21, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted regular approval to selpercatinib (Retevmo) for adult patients with locally advanced or metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with a RET gene fusion (as detected by an FDA-approved test). The FDA also approved the Oncomine ...
A novel imaging technique may significantly improve the accuracy of the diagnosis of basal cell carcinoma (BCC) compared to clinical and dermoscopic examinations alone, according to new research presented at the 31st European Academy of Dermatology and Venereology (EADV) Congress. The study found...
Little is known about patients with cancer’s social welfare and how it affects their health outcomes. To address this, researchers at University of California (UC) San Diego School of Medicine and partnering institutions assessed the prevalence and impact of various social risk factors in patients...
New data show that the immuno-oncology drug atezolizumab may be a safe and effective treatment for patients with stage IB to IIIB non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) prior to surgery, according to a study led by researchers with The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center–Arthur G. James...
As reported in The Lancet by Livingstone et al, the final analysis of the German phase II IMMUNED trial showed significantly improved recurrence-free survival with adjuvant nivolumab/ipilimumab and nivolumab alone vs placebo in patients with resected stage IV melanoma who had no evidence of disease ...
In a National Cancer Database analysis reported in JAMA Network Open, Brand et al found that patients with colon cancer who lived farther from their treatment facility and those with no insurance or Medicaid alone were more likely to present with advanced-stage disease. As stated by the...
In a circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) substudy from the CALGB/SWOG-80405/Alliance trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Kanwal Raghav, MD, MBBS, and colleagues found that first-line use of the anti-EGFR antibody cetuximab combined with chemotherapy was associated with only a small number ...
Researchers at The Marvin and Concetta Greenberg Pancreatic Cancer Institute at Fox Chase Cancer Center have found that a new synthetic lethal agent could be an effective treatment for pancreatic cancers with DNA damage repair (DDR) defects. Igor Astsaturov, MD, PhD, a co-director of the Institute...