A study by Blackburn et al investigating the risks of aging-related diseases such as heart disease and diabetes among thyroid cancer survivors has found that although younger and older survivors had an increased risk for these diseases, those younger than age 40 had a higher risk for hypertension,...
This image of fluoroscopy documents modern cancer diagnostic possibilities. It is in startling contrast to the photograph of fluoroscopy taken a decade earlier. Published by James T. Case, MD, in 1914 to illustrate his book Stereoroentgenography of the Alimentary Tract, it presents the advances in ...
Donald Coffey, PhD, a distinguished Johns Hopkins Professor and prostate cancer expert, who was the former Director of the Brady Urological Research Laboratory and Deputy Director of the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center, died on November 9, 2017, at the age of 85. In his more than 50 years at...
Cancer memoirs come in a variety of literary styles and voices. Not surprisingly, the most poignant cancer memoirs are by those who are writing, in essence, their final words before departing this earth. The most widely read of that variety has been the beautifully written best seller When Breath...
ON SEPTEMBER 22, 2017, nivolumab (Opdivo) was granted accelerated approval for treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma in patients previously treated with sorafenib (Nexavar).1,2 Supporting Efficacy Data APPROVAL WAS based on findings in a 154-patient subgroup of the CheckMate 040 trial consisting...
HERE IS A BRIEF LOOK at the study findings and clinical implications of several recent and important clinical trials in neoplastic hematology. Attention is focused on clonal myeloid disorders, acute lymphoblastic leukemia, lymphoma, and plasma cell dyscrasias. Clonal Myeloid Disorders STUDY:...
Even with equivalent access to care, black patients with breast cancer may fare worse than white patients with breast cancer, according to Lawrence H. Kushi, ScD, Director of Scientific Policy at the Kaiser Permanente Northern California Division of Research in Oakland. “Accounting for...
Staying up-to-date with peer-reviewed oncology literature is a daunting task. To assist readers, The ASCO Post has summarized a number of studies recently published in the Journal of Oncology Practice (JOP) and the Journal of Clinical Oncology (JCO). Survival as Quality Metric in Cancer Care In a...
A deeper understanding of biology has allowed significant advances in the treatment of breast cancer. In the early-stage setting, standard pathology measures can help identify which subset of patients with hormone receptor–positive breast cancers are more likely to experience benefit from...
In a single-center study reported in the Journal of Oncology Practice, Katya Losk, MPH, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and colleagues found that an intervention including surgeon initiation of gene-expression profile testing with Oncotype DX significantly reduced the time to testing, receipt of...
A matched case-controlled study among Medicare beneficiaries with metastatic lung, colorectal, breast, and prostate cancers has found that palliative care consultation significantly reduced total health-care costs following intervention. According to data presented at the 2017 Palliative and...
Nicaragua, situated between Costa Rica and Honduras, is the poorest country in Central America. Following the U.S. occupation in 1912, the Somoza family began a brutal political dynasty that would end in 1979 during the bloody Nicaraguan Revolution. Marcela G. del Carmen, MD, MPH, Chief Medical...
Addressing the need to integrate palliative and supportive care practices into medical specialties to ensure optimal patient-centered care across the cancer continuum and the evidence-based remedies to accomplish that goal were the focus of the nearly 300 study abstracts presented at the 2017...
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, Sheila N. Garland, PhD, R Psych, and Jun J. Mao, MD, MSCE, present...
On September 22, 2017, pembrolizumab (Keytruda) was granted accelerated approval for treatment of recurrent locally advanced or metastatic, gastric or gastroesophageal junction adenocarcinoma with tumors expressing programmed cell death ligand 1 (PD-L1), as determined by a U.S. Food and Drug...
A RECENTLY PUBLISHED STUDY in JAMA Oncology, led by Mohamed Sorror, MD, MSc, and Elihu Estey, MD, of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center (Fred Hutch), involving five collaborating institutions, provides a novel model to predict 1-year survival rates of patients after beginning treatment...
Oncologists are apt to give patients the worst news of their lives: You have cancer. Yet studies show that, by and large, despite the stressful aspects of treating people with a life-threatening disease, oncologists report one of the highest percentages of professional satisfaction among medical...
ON OCTOBER 18, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved axicabtagene ciloleucel (Yescarta), a cell-based gene therapy, to treat adult patients with certain types of large B-cell lymphoma who have not responded to or who have relapsed after at least two other kinds of treatment....
On April 28, 2017, brigatinib (Alunbrig) was granted accelerated approval for the treatment of patients with metastatic anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK)-positive non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who have had disease progression on or are intolerant to crizotinib (Xalkori).1,2 Supporting Efficacy...
On June 22, 2017, regular approvals were granted to dabrafenib (Tafinlar) and trametinib (Mekinist) given in combination for the treatment of patients with metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with BRAF V600E mutation as detected by a U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved...
On July 17, 2017, neratinib (Nerlynx) a dual inhibitor of HER2 and epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR), was approved for extended adjuvant treatment of adults with early-stage HER2-overexpressed/amplified breast cancer following adjuvant trastuzumab (Herceptin)-based therapy.1,2 Supporting...
While age remains a major risk factor for breast cancer, with nearly 80% of new cases occurring in women aged 50 years and older, women diagnosed at a younger age generally have poorer outcomes. This is partly because premenopausal women are more likely to have triple-negative breast cancer, which ...
On September 14, 2017, copanlisib (Aliqopa) was granted accelerated approval for treatment of adult patients with relapsed follicular lymphoma who have received at least two prior systemic therapies.1,2 Supporting Efficacy Data Approval was based on durable responses observed in a multicenter phase ...
In the Clinic provides overviews of novel oncology agents, addressing indications, mechanisms of action, administration recommendations, safety profiles, and other essential information needed for the appropriate clinical use of these drugs. On October 18, 2017, the chimeric antigen receptor (CAR)...
Although a majority of major cancer centers may test for minimal residual disease (MRD), a recent survey conducted by researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center, Tampa, Florida, suggests most oncologists remain uncertain about what to do with the results. At the National Comprehensive Cancer Network®...
Although the indications to initiate treatment for chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) have not changed, determining the optimal first-line treatment and sequence of therapies once treatment has begun remain challenges for providers. At the National Comprehensive Cancer Network® (NCCN®) 12th Annual...
In a study reported in JAMA Oncology, Shaikh et al found that despite existing recommendations, mismatch repair (MMR)-deficiency testing is underused in patients with colorectal cancer, including younger patients. As noted by the authors, MMR deficiency is observed in up to 15% of sporadic...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Chow et al have developed a model that distinguishes risk groups for ischemic heart disease and stroke in 5-year survivors of childhood cancer. Study Details The study included data from 13,060 participants in the Childhood Cancer Survivor Study...
Health insurance coverage differences account for nearly one-half of the black-white survival disparity in colorectal cancer patients, according to a new study published by Sineshaw et al in Gastroenterology. The findings reinforce the importance of equitable health insurance coverage to mitigate...
In the phase III BFORE trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Cortes et al, the SRC/ABL kinase inhibitor bosutinib (Bosulif) improved response rates vs imatinib in first-line treatment of patients with Philadelphia chromosome (Ph)-positive chronic phase chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) ...
A prospective study by Palmer et al assessing the relationship of type 2 diabetes and the incidence of estrogen receptor–negative and estrogen receptor–positive breast cancer among African American women has found statistically significant evidence of an increased risk of estrogen...
Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a new indication for fulvestrant (Faslodex), expanding the drug's approved use to include combined therapy with abemaciclib (Verzenio), a cyclin-dependent kinase (CDK) 4/6 inhibitor, for the treatment of hormone receptor–positive,...
Pembrolizumab (Keytruda) treatment was active in patients with programmed cell death ligand 1 (PD-L1)–positive advanced cervical cancer enrolled in the phase Ib KEYNOTE-028 trial. The findings were reported by Frenel et al in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. Study Details In the advanced...
Donald Coffey, PhD, a distinguished Johns Hopkins professor and prostate cancer expert, who was the former Director of the Brady Urological Research Laboratory and Deputy Director of the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center, died on November 9 at the age of 85. Long Career at Johns Hopkins In his...
In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Maurer et al found that event-free survival at 24 months (EFS24) was associated with prolonged subsequent overall survival among patients with peripheral T-cell lymphoma (PTCL). Study Details The study involved patients with systemic PTCL...
In the phase III DATA trial reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute by Vivianne C.G. Tjan-Heijnen, MD, PhD, of the Maastricht University Medical Centre, the Netherlands, and colleagues, 12% of women with breast cancer who had chemotherapy-induced ovarian function failure...
It began, as so many do, with what a doctor often calls “a small spot,” a vague description that makes a potentially fatal disease sound like something that, with a slight bit of attention, can be ridded, like erasing a misplaced comma. In 2015, during a routine mammogram, doctors found one “small ...
Aldous Huxley’s classic 1932 dystopian novel Brave New World pictures an eerie future where humans are genetically bred, altered to create worthy citizens. Welcome back to the future. First there was the astounding feat of sequencing the entire human genome; now, thanks to a revolutionary...
THE LONG-TERM RESULTS of a phase III clinical trial indicate that survival rates for patients receiving chemoradiation for unresectable, locally advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) may be more than twice as high as previous estimates, setting a new benchmark of survival for patients with...
VAGINAL CUFF BRACHYTHERAPY plus chemotherapy failed to show superiority over pelvic radiation therapy for women with high-risk stage I–II endometrial cancer in a phase III trial.1 Furthermore, vaginal cuff brachytherapy plus chemotherapy led to more pelvic and para-aortic nodal recurrences and...
THE PHASE III ARCHER 1050 trial has shown superior progression-free survival with the second-generation irreversible epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) tyrosine kinase inhibitor dacomitinib vs gefitinib (Iressa) in the first-line treatment of advanced EGFR-mutant non–small-cell lung cancer...
As reported in JAMA Oncology by Almassi et al, extragonadal androgen ablation with the nonsteroidal CYP17A1 inhibitor ketoconazole improved outcome in men with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer according to the number of inherited HSD3B1 (1245C) alleles. HSD3B1 (1245C) is associated...
As reported by Ganz et al in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, long-term follow-up of patients in the National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Project (NSABP) Protocol B-31/NRG Oncology trial showed no worsening of cardiac function or quality of life with the addition of adjuvant trastuzumab...
In a study reported in The Lancet Oncology, Fidler et al found that cancer burden was higher worldwide among women vs men aged 20 to 39 in 2012 and that the incidence was higher but mortality lower in very high vs low Human Development Index regions. Study Details The study involved data from the ...
In a 2013 survey, oncologists in the United States and Canada said they aim to retire at about age 64 or 65—but the majority transition into retirement in the few years after turning 65.1 When oncologists reach the point of retirement, the transition from ever-busy physician to retiree can be a...
Here is a brief look at the study findings and clinical implications of several recent and important clinical trials in neoplastic hematology. Attention is focused on hematopoietic cell transplantation in a variety of hematologic malignancies, with investigations addressing the role of maintenance ...
According to Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) data, patients with Hodgkin lymphoma and non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) have 5-year survival rates of 86% and 71%, respectively.1 Although the increased number of survivors is welcome proof of the success of new treatment regimens, it also ...
New therapeutic agents for acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL) have led to dramatic improvement in remission rates, but questions concerning the proper sequencing and combination of these agents remain. At the National Comprehensive Cancer Network® (NCCN®) 13th Annual Congress: Hematologic...
Pembrolizumab (Keytruda) may be a better choice than standard of care for patients with recurrent or metastatic head and neck squamous cell carcinoma, especially those whose tumors express programmed cell death ligand 1 (PD-L1) in 50% or more of cells, suggest results of the phase III KEYNOTE-040...
Early routine specialist palliative care for patients recently diagnosed with malignant pleural mesothelioma did not impact quality of life, an international multicenter study has found.1 “Regular early specialist palliative care for patients was not associated with improved quality of life, as...