The implementation of a collaborative program between North American and Mexican medical institutions to achieve sustainable, high-quality care at a public hospital in the United States–Mexico border region for children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) has resulted in significant improvement ...
My father is deaf. Born deaf, he is now 75 years old. He uses his voice, but he sounds strange to a hearing person when he speaks. He uses lip-reading techniques to communicate. A year ago, he was diagnosed with Hodgkin lymphoma. We did his oncology itinerary together. My father cannot go alone to...
Guest Editor’s Note: Despite its high prevalence, cancer pain remains undertreated. Racial disparities present further challenges to assessing and managing pain. Music therapy, a nonpharmacologic intervention, has been documented to be effective in controlling cancer pain. In this article, Kevin T. ...
Prior authorization of medical procedures, services, and medications has been a standard requirement of health-care providers for decades. Rising health-care costs, specifically the escalating prices of cancer drug therapies, have led to a new focus by payers, providers, and policymakers on prior...
ASCO and Conquer Cancer, the ASCO Foundation, will recognize researchers, patient advocates, philanthropists, teachers, and global oncology leaders who have reshaped cancer care with the Society’s highest honors at the 2023 ASCO Annual Meeting in Chicago. Hear from select award recipients at the...
Jonathan W. Friedberg, MD, MMSc, Director of the James P. Wilmot Cancer Institute, grew up in a suburb of Milwaukee. While his school friends were attending camp, he spent his summers working on the family farm. “Perhaps the hardest work I’ve ever done was haying on a hot, humid night in July,...
The respected members of the oncology community listed here are among some of those who passed away in 2022–2023. The ASCO Post remembers them, their lives, and their contributions to cancer research and treatment. Robert J. Gillies, PhD Moffitt Cancer Center and the global research community lost ...
ASCO and Conquer Cancer, the ASCO Foundation, will recognize researchers, patient advocates, philanthropists, teachers, and global oncology leaders who have reshaped cancer care around the world with the Society’s highest honors at the 2023 ASCO Annual Meeting in Chicago. Hear from select award...
Guest Editor’s Note: Despite its high prevalence, cancer pain remains undertreated. Racial disparities present further challenges to assessing and managing pain. Music therapy, a nonpharmacologic intervention, has been documented to be effective in controlling cancer pain. In this article, Kevin T. ...
U.S. mortality rates with cancer as the underlying or primary cause decreased during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, whereas mortality rates with cancer as a contributing cause increased, according to a new study published by Zhao et al in JCO Oncology Practice. The findings demonstrated...
The questions I am challenged to answer are twofold: (1) Should you attend the 2023 ASCO Annual Meeting? (2) If you attend, how is your time best spent? Most people agree scientific conferences are important venues for cancer researchers and clinicians to share and discuss research findings,...
Cancer is a leading cause of death in every country worldwide.1 In 2020, almost 10 million people died of cancer, a number that is expected to rise to 16.3 million by 2040.2 In addition, cancer incidence continues to grow, driven by an aging and growing population and changes in the prevalence and...
In a new colocation model for cancer diagnostic services, researchers have found that a new program installed at a community health center that cares for historically underserved populations was able to reduce the time to cancer diagnosis from a median of 32 days to 12 days, according to an article ...
Cancer research sites demonstrated the utility of new resources designed to increase the diversity of participants in cancer clinical trials, although challenges remain, according to two studies published recently in JCO Oncology Practice.1,2 The studies examine the results from a collaborative...
Clinical trials set the treatment standards for cancer care. However, for select populations, such as those who are older, Black, or facing socioeconomic challenges, access to clinical trials and health care generally remains limited. Barriers to clinical trial participation are numerous and...
What is team-based cancer care, and how has it evolved over the past decade? A special series in ASCO’s JCO Oncology Practice highlights transformations in team-based delivery models within the cancer care system and their potential direction. A carefully curated series of 15 peer-reviewed articles ...
ASCO has elected Robin Zon, MD, FACP, FASCO, a long-time member and volunteer, as its President beginning in June 2024. Dr. Zon will take office as President-Elect immediately following the ASCO Annual Business Meeting in Chicago on June 5, 2023. Five additional members were elected to the ASCO...
A new ASCO guideline on opioids in managing pain from cancer or cancer treatment in adults provides recommendations on administering them in the midst of interventions to address the public health crisis from their misuse and related deaths across the country.1 “ASCO took wonderful leadership in...
For more than 2 decades, Don S. Dizon, MD, FACP, FASCO, has devoted his medical career to the care of women’s cancers and the sexual health of cancer survivors of all genders and sexual identities. Early in his career, Dr. Dizon founded the Center for Sexuality, Intimacy, and Fertility at Women...
The field of precision oncology has become so complex that even experienced oncologists can find it challenging to decipher the molecular test results of tumor tissue and navigate treatment options for patients. Investigators revealed that a new program may aid gastrointestinal cancer physicians in ...
The COVID-19 pandemic transformed the world, and nowhere more so than in the health-care arena. Significant changes happened almost overnight in the delivery of medical care to focus on the safety and convenience of patients, staff, and providers. Although pilot efforts to integrate telemedicine...
ASCO has elected Robin Zon, MD, FACP, FASCO, a long-time member and volunteer, to lead as its President beginning in June 2024. Dr. Zon will take office as President-Elect immediately following the ASCO Annual Business Meeting in Chicago on June 5, 2023. Five additional members were also elected to ...
Editor’s Note: ASCO was deeply saddened by the news that Dr. Jeff Ward passed away on November 3, 2022. In an interview with Dr. Ward this past summer, published in ASCO Connection (August 30, 2022), ASCO recognized Dr. Ward’s commitment to exceptional patient care and public advocacy. An...
A new study, published recently in JCO Oncology Practice, found that oncologists have different perspectives on how to select starting doses for patients with metastatic cancer.1 The study shared findings from a 2021 international survey of 367 medical oncologists who treat patients with metastatic ...
An updated ASCO guideline recommends lutetium-177–labeled PSMA-617 (LuPSMA), a targeted radioligand therapy, for patients with prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA)-positive metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer who have been treated with one prior line of androgen receptor pathway...
I continue to be struck by the creativity of medical oncologists. The reimagining of dosing, duration, or regimen composition to respond to patient symptoms or preferences is like a master chef in the kitchen. Although standardization has, with good reason, become the paragon, delivering...
It has been well documented that breast cancer is the most common malignancy in adolescent and young adult (AYA) women aged 15 to 39 years, accounting for 30% of cancers among this population.1 In addition, 5.6% of all invasive breast cancers occur in AYA women.1 A presentation by Rebecca H....
In a study reported in JCO Oncology Practice, Ferrario et al found that while use of palliative care among commercially insured patients aged 25 to 64 years in the United States with metastatic cancer has increased since 2001, use remained at 40% among patients with very poor–prognosis cancers in...
In a study reported in JCO Oncology Practice, Voleti et al identified the proportion of patients with cancer receiving routine clinical care who reported financial hardship and analyzed risk factors for financial hardship. The researchers found that patients who reported experiencing financial...
In a study reported in JCO Oncology Practice, Lucie M. Turcotte, MD, MPH, and colleagues found that real-world costs for care for commercially insured U.S. pediatric patients with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) were higher in those diagnosed at age 10 or older and have increased substantially...
ASCO and the African Organisation for Research and Training in Cancer (AORTIC) have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) committing the two organizations to collaborate to advance cancer research in Africa. Harnessing the respective programs, leaders, and member networks of both...
In a survey study reported in JCO Oncology Practice, Jimenez et al found that half of surveyed oncologists reported sometimes or usually using reduced doses at initiation of a new systemic treatment in patients with metastatic cancer in order to potentially reduce toxicity. Study Details The study...
In a study reported in JCO Oncology Practice, Li et al identified elements of increasing financial burden associated with the use of high-cost targeted oral anticancer drugs among Medicare patients between 2011 and 2016. The study used data from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results...
The numbers are dizzying. The costs of cancer care in the United States are rising so fast that by 2030, it is projected the national cancer-attributable costs will total more than $246 billion, up from $183 billion in 2015—a 34% increase.1 And although the total global economic burden of cancer is ...
As a nonpartisan organization, the American Cancer Society has an overarching goal to improve the lives of patients with cancer and their families. We believe all individuals should have an equitable opportunity to prevent, find, detect, and survive cancer, irrespective of geography. The June 24...
Here is a summary of the strategies developed by ASCO and the Association of Community Cancer Centers (ACCC) to increase participation by minority patients in cancer clinical trials and ensure greater equity, diversity, and inclusion in research studies. For a detailed list of the recommendations,...
Research shows that although 15% of Black individuals and 13% of Hispanic individuals have cancer in the United States, only between 4% and 6% of clinical trial participants are Black and between 3% and 6% are Hispanic.1-3 To improve these statistics, in 2020, ASCO and the Association of Community...
It has been 14 years since a collaboration between the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and Pfizer identified a unique role for cyclin-dependent kinase 4/6 (CDK4/6) inhibitors in estrogen receptor (ER)-positive human cell line models and demonstrated that these agents act...
In countries with a high income, research in oncology is sponsored by funding agencies and industry, which has meaningfully improved survival outcomes of patients with cancer. In contrast, the African continent is disadvantaged in all aspects of human development, particularly in the fields of...
Recently, a new ASCO study,1 published in JCO Oncology Practice, found that among respondents participating in the survey, most oncology practices do not systematically collect data related to sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI). The study points to the need to increase understanding...
Researchers have, for the first time, identified genes that may predict response to a therapy for a blood cancer that can have serious side effects for some patients. The therapy, selinexor, is part of the treatment armamentarium for multiple myeloma, but the ability to target its use to patients...
Telemedicine stepped up to the plate when the COVID-19 pandemic swept the globe. Oncology providers—and practitioners in all specialties—had to rapidly adapt to a telemedicine format when face-to-face visits were severely limited. This scenario had its benefits for both patients and providers (and...
In a study presented at the 2022 ASCO Annual Meeting (Abstract 10502) and simultaneously published in JCO Precision Oncology, Veda N. Giri, MD, and colleagues found that Black men with prostate cancer exhibited a lower frequency and narrower spectrum of germline pathogenic or likely pathogenic...
The COVID-19 pandemic and the confluence of events that followed—including the rapid development of vaccines, the mixed messaging on mitigation efforts to prevent coronavirus infection, and the growing political polarization—helped spark public mistrust and skepticism toward science. This mistrust...
In a study reported in JCO Oncology Practice, Taparra et al identified differences in 10-year survival and surgery-to-radiotherapy intervals among disaggregated Asian American and Native Hawaiian/other Pacific Islander women with early-stage breast cancer. The study used National Cancer Database...
In an effort to highlight cancer care inequities during the COVID-19 pandemic, ASCO has launched the Interactive Map of Oncology, a data visualization tool that allows users to explore geographic distribution of systemic and socioeconomic factors that influence cancer care delivery in the United...
Debra Patt, MD, PhD, MBA, Executive Vice President of Policy and Strategic Initiatives for Texas Oncology, was reared in Plano, Texas, a city in the sprawling Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex. “My father was an electrical engineer with a PhD, and all throughout my childhood, I was exposed to the wonders ...
With the rapid acceleration of the spread of the COVID-19 virus in the United States in March 2020, telemedicine visits became more common for cancer care. However, in an evaluation of telemedicine inequities among patients with 21 common cancers, there were distinctly lower levels of telemedicine...
The North Star of an organization is its mission statement. At ASCO, no initiative gets the green light unless it can fulfill the Society’s mission. ASCO updated its mission statement in 2020 specifically to reinforce our goal of reducing disparities, changing it to read: “Conquering cancer through ...
In an analysis from the ASCO Quality Oncology Practice Initiative (QOPI) reported in JCO Oncology Practice, Chen et al found that a high proportion of patients with rectal cancer do not receive guideline-recommended pretreatment staging transrectal ultrasound or pelvic magnetic resonance imaging...