A new study published by Kichenadasse et al in JNCCN—Journal of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network concentrates on how immunotherapy-related adverse events may impact more than one organ in a single patient. This study provides new information on how frequently multiorgan side effects occur...
On September 4, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved pralsetinib (Gavreto) for the treatment of adult patients with metastatic RET fusion–positive non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), as detected by an FDA-approved test. The approval is based on data from the phase I/II ARROW...
Recently, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted Priority Review to agents for the treatment of refractory multiple myeloma, metastatic breast cancer, and metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC); gave Fast Track designation to treatments for NTRK mutation–positive solid tumors...
Low-intensity smokers—individuals who smoke fewer than 10 cigarettes per day—are more than twice as likely to die of lung disease and more than eight times as likely to die of lung cancer than nonsmokers, according to research presented by Balte et al at the European Respiratory Society...
The standard of care since 2003, sentinel lymph node biopsy has dramatically reduced the risk of lymphedema in early breast cancer, but more than 6% of patients still develop the condition. At the ASCO20 Virtual Education Program, Nicole L. Stout, DPT, CLT-LANA, FAPTA, Research Assistant Professor...
Two gynecologic oncologists and ASCO’s Chief Medical Officer and Executive Vice President Richard L. Schilsky, MD, FACP, FSCT, FASCO, commented on the findings of the TROPHIMMUN trial for The ASCO Post. “The authors demonstrate efficacy of a new treatment approach for gestational trophoblastic...
An updated cervical cancer screening guideline from the American Cancer Society has called for less—and more simplified—screening. The guideline was published by Elizabeth T.H. Fontham, MPH, DrPH, of Louisiana State University School of Public Health, New Orleans, and colleagues in CA: A Cancer...
Women with early-stage cervical cancer treated with minimally invasive radical hysterectomy had a 71% increased risk of recurrence and a 56% increased risk of death compared with those treated with open radical hysterectomy, according to a systematic review and meta-analysis of 15 studies involving ...
Combining the HER2-targeted therapy trastuzumab with carboplatin and paclitaxel improved survival rates for women with a rare, aggressive type of endometrial cancer, according to findings published by Amanda N. Fader, MD, of Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, and colleagues in Clinical...
Discussant of the abstract on the WEE1 inhibitor adavosertib, Shannon N. Westin, MD, MPH, FACOG, Associate Professor and clinical investigator at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, called the interaction between p53 and WEE1 an “opportunity for synthetic lethality.” She continued:...
Monotherapy with the experimental WEE1 inhibitor adavosertib has shown activity in patients with advanced recurrent or metastatic uterine serous carcinoma,1 according to data presented during the 2020 Society of Gynecologic Oncology (SGO) Annual Meeting on Women’s Cancer Webinar Series. The initial ...
The invited discussant of the two trials in cervical and endometrial cancers presented at the ESMO Congress 2019 was Nicoletta Colombo, MD, of the University of Milan-Bicocca in Italy, who commented on what she called “exciting results in cancers with unmet needs.” Dr. Colombo noted: “The studies...
Kathleen N. Moore, MD, Associate Professor of Gynecologic Oncology and Director of the Oklahoma TSET Phase I Clinical Trials Program, Stephenson Cancer Center, Oklahoma City, underscored the importance of studying patients with stable disease and less robust partial response, not just those with...
In studies reported at the ESMO Congress 2019, immunotherapy yielded encouraging outcomes in two gynecologic cancer populations in need of new treatments, including patients with advanced cervical cancer that is microsatellite-stable and patients previously treated for advanced endometrial cancer....
An updated analysis of the phase III VELIA/GOG-3005 trial, presented during the 2020 Society of Gynecologic Oncology (SGO) Annual Meeting on Women’s Cancer Webinar Series,1 suggested synergy between the poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor veliparib and platinum chemotherapy in the...
Discussant of the DESKTOP III and SOC1 trials, Robert L. Coleman, MD, of U.S. Oncology Research in Woodlands, Texas, congratulated the authors of both trials. He put these results in perspective with the GOG-0213 study, which did not show a survival benefit for secondary surgery. “There are general ...
Two phase III trials provided support for secondary cytoreductive surgery in women with recurrent ovarian cancer, with the caveats that patient selection is key and the surgery should be performed at sites of excellence. The results of the DESKTOP III and SOC1 trials, both presented during the...
Ana Oaknin, MD, PhD, Head of the Gynecologic Cancer Program at Vall d’Hebron Institute of Oncology, Barcelona, discussed the PRIMA/ENGOT-OV26/GOG-3012 trial along with the results of the phase III PAOLA-1/ENGOT-ov25 trial of olaparib plus bevacizumab maintenance. All three trials—PRIMA, PAOLA-1,...
In women with advanced ovarian cancer responding to first-line chemotherapy, maintenance therapy with the poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor niraparib significantly reduced the risk of disease progression by 38% overall and by 60% in women with BRCA mutations. Even patients without a...
Thomas J. Herzog, MD, Deputy Director, University of Cincinnati Cancer Center, who presented a distillation of the PRIMA trial data along with updated results of the phase III PAOLA-1 trial of olaparib plus bevacizumab maintenance, called the data “practice-changing.” “We’ve suspected for a while...
Based on multiple phase III prospective trials, there is evidence that both poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitors and antiangiogenic therapies such as bevacizumab provide benefit when utilized in a maintenance strategy in the first-line treatment of advanced epithelial ovarian cancer (GOG...
A study published by Gaba et al in BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynaecology has found that risk‐reducing early salpingectomy and delayed oophorectomy is highly acceptable among premenopausal women at increased risk for developing ovarian cancer—particularly among patients...
Doxorubicin is a standard of care in patients with advanced inoperable soft-tissue sarcoma. In the EPAZ study, German researchers tested whether pazopanib showed comparable efficacy to doxorubicin in the first-line treatment of elderly patients with soft-tissue sarcoma. Grünwald et al reported in...
On September 1, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved oral azacitidine (Onureg; also known as CC-486) for the continued treatment of adult patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) who achieved first complete remission or complete remission with incomplete blood count recovery...
After more than 20 years of failed strategies to improve survival rates for locally advanced lung cancers, checkpoint inhibitors have revolutionized therapy, but prognoses still lag behind other tumor types. During the ASCO20 Virtual Education Program, Mark G. Kris, MD, FASCO, a thoracic medical...
A new study from the UK Coronavirus Cancer Monitoring Project (UKCCMP) has found that, compared with patients who have other malignancies, patients with blood cancers are more vulnerable to the effects of COVID-19 infection. These results were published by Lee et al in The Lancet Oncology. As...
The message still needs to get out that metastatic castration-sensitive prostate cancer should be treated with both androgen-deprivation therapy (ADT) and either docetaxel or an androgen receptor pathway inhibitor. In spite of “overwhelming” support for ADT plus abiraterone/prednisone,...
The invited discussant of the ORIENT-11 trial, Misako Nagasaka, MD, a medical oncologist at Karmanos Cancer Institute, Wayne State University, Detroit, noted that, if approved, sintilimab will join a crowded list of first-line immuno-oncology agents for advanced non–small cell lung cancer,...
Given the rising costs of cancer care, many patients with cancer and cancer survivors are challenged by financial toxicity, the burden of care costs. Many struggle to choose a health insurance plan that best meets their needs. Moreover, these challenges are often exacerbated by limited health...
Chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy is a debilitating and enduring adverse effect of many antineoplastic agents, which negatively impacts the quality of life of patients with cancer and survivors. Current pharmacotherapy has limited efficacy and causes undesirable effects. In this...
For patients with non–small cell lung cancers (NSCLC) marked by RET gene fusions, the targeted therapy selpercatinib was well tolerated and achieved durable objective responses in the majority of participants in the phase I/II LIBRETTO-001 trial, according to researchers from The University of...
Although radiotherapy is integral to the multidisciplinary therapy used in the treatment of common childhood and adolescent and young adult (AYA) cancers, including Hodgkin lymphomas, sarcomas, and breast cancer, the treatment is a strong risk factor for a secondary breast malignancy, especially...
Daniela Matei, MD, Diana, Princess of Wales Professor of Cancer Research at Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, grew up Sibiu, a picturesque Romanian city situated at the foothills of the Cindrel Mountains in historic Transylvania. “Both of my parents were physicians, and some of my ...
Robotic surgery for patients with early-stage oropharyngeal squamous cell cancer may be associated with improved health outcomes, including better long-term survival, according to a study published by Nguyen et al in JAMA Oncology. Transoral robotic surgery is a minimally invasive procedure in...
In a study published by Gao et al in The American Journal of Pathology, scientists reported the discovery of an increased level of the neuroprotein sortilin in pancreatic cancer cells. The investigators speculated that this finding may lead to the development of more effective treatment for...
Sanjiv Sam Gambhir, MD, PhD, Professor and Chair of Radiology at the Stanford School of Medicine and an internationally recognized pioneer in molecular imaging, died on July 18, 2020, of cancer. He was 57. The Virginia and D.K. Ludwig Professor of Cancer Research, Dr. Gambhir dedicated his career...
Cornelius O. “Skip” Granai, MD, Founder of the Program in Women’s Oncology at Women & Infants Hospital of Rhode Island, died on June 28, 2020, after a long bout with cancer. Dr. Granai strongly believed that cancer care for women should encompass both breast and gynecologic cancers, according...
Patients prescribed tamoxifen may not report when they interrupt or discontinue therapy, according to the results of a study published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.1 Using blood draws to determine serum levels of tamoxifen among 1,177 premenopausal women with invasive breast cancer, the...
Measuring serum levels of tamoxifen among premenopausal women being treated for invasive breast cancer identified a “worryingly high proportion of patients, one in six, who were nonadherent to therapy at only 1 year after treatment prescription,” researchers reported in the Journal of Clinical...
The text and photograph here are excerpted from a four-volume series of books titled Oncology: Tumors & Treatment, A Photographic History, The Anesthesia Era 1845–1875 by Stanley B. Burns, MD, FACS, and Elizabeth A. Burns. The photograph appears courtesy of Stanley B. Burns, MD, and The Burns...
Of the tens of thousands of genes in cellular DNA, one group of genes is tasked with ensuring that every cell reproduces itself exactly when it divides to make new cells. Perhaps the best known of these genes are the BRCA genes, which if inherited with a significant alteration, confer a markedly...
Neha Vapiwala, MD, FACR, Professor and Vice Chair of Education in the Department of Radiation Oncology and newly appointed Dean of Admissions at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn), Philadelphia, was born in India to parents who aspired to emigrate to the...
The ASCO Post’s Integrative Oncology series is intended to facilitate the availability of evidence-based information on integrative and complementary therapies sometimes used by patients with cancer. In this installment, Gary Deng, MD, PhD, and Jyothirmai Gubili, MS, present updated information on ...
The ASCO Post is pleased to continue this occasional special focus on the worldwide cancer burden. In this issue, we feature a close look at the cancer incidence and mortality rates in Cambodia. The aim of this special feature is to highlight the global cancer burden for various countries of the...
The COVID-19 pandemic is an additional competing risk to factor in when making decisions about anticancer treatment for older adults. It poses a potential barrier to equal and evidence-based management of cancer in this group of patients. Implementing geriatric assessments in routine clinical...
The Association of Community Cancer Centers (ACCC) announced the winning programs for its 10th annual ACCC Innovator Awards, highlighting the year’s leading-edge strategies to challenges faced by oncology programs and practices across the country. The eight ACCC Innovator Award winners feature...
For nearly 30 years, from the time he was a young resident at the Collis P. Huntington Memorial Hospital for Cancer Research of Harvard University, until his death from lung cancer on August 31, 1969, David A. Karnofsky, MD, dedicated himself to the pursuit of scientific excellence and the...
The dramatic advances in the diagnosis and treatment of multiple myeloma over the past 20 years have resulted in significant improvements in overall survival, with 5-year relative survival rates now around 50% and more than 60% for patients younger than age 70.1 The proteasome inhibitors...
Three years ago, former Chief Executive Officer of ASCO, Allen S. Lichter, MD, Laurence H. Baker, DO, Professor in the Departments of Internal Medicine and Pharmacology at the University of Michigan Medical School in Ann Arbor; Leonard Saltz, MD, a gastrointestinal oncologist at Memorial Sloan...
JCO Oncology Practice has published an article on rural cancer care as part of the State of Cancer Care in America series. “Closing the Rural Cancer Care Gap: Three Institutional Approaches” draws from data presented during the second State of Cancer Care in America live event as well as supporting ...