As more patients with cancer have their tumors genomically profiled and more therapies targeting genomic alterations enter clinical trials, the task of connecting patients with trials for which they are eligible can be especially challenging. The novel computer platform MatchMiner, developed by the ...
In the past year, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved four treatment options for patients with breast cancer, which are summarized herein. T-DXd for HER2-Low Breast Cancer On August 5, 2022, the FDA approved fam-trastuzumab deruxtecan-nxki (Enhertu; T-DXd) for adult patients with...
In a single-center case-control study reported as a research letter in JAMA Oncology, Peeri et al found that women with polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS) may be at an increased risk of developing pancreatic cancer. Study Details The study involved data from the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center ...
In a Chinese single-center phase II trial reported in JAMA Surgery, Wu et al found neoadjuvant intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IMRT) followed by hepatectomy could be an effective treatment option in patients with centrally located hepatocellular carcinoma. Study Details In the study, 38 patients...
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 case-control study reported in JAMA Oncology, Minkyo Song, MD, PhD, and colleagues found that seropositivity for gastric antiparietal cell antibodies (APCAs) was associated with an increased risk of gastric cancer among younger Finnish women who were seronegative for antibodies to Helicobacter ...
Computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans may miss the detection of some pancreatic cancer tumors, narrowing the window for life-saving curative surgery, according to new research presented at the United European Gastroenterology (UEG) Week 2022 (Abstract OP192). The...
In a single-center retrospective cohort study reported in JAMA Network Open, Titan et al identified the proportion of women with a history of smoking undergoing breast cancer screening with mammography who were eligible for low-dose computed tomography (CT) lung cancer screening, as well as the...
In a phase Ib/II study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Christopher J. Hoimes, MD, and colleagues found that first-line enfortumab vedotin-ejfv plus pembrolizumab produced a high response rate and prolonged response durations in cisplatin-ineligible, previously untreated patients with...
Invited discussant James Larkin, PhD, a clinical researcher at the Royal Marsden Hospital, London, commented on the findings from NICHE-2.1 “These striking data are consistent with the recent report in locally advanced mismatch repair–deficient [dMMR] rectal cancer from Memorial Sloan Kettering.2...
Treatment with neoadjuvant immunotherapy in colon cancer resulted in major pathologic responses in 95% of patients, NICHE-2 investigators reported at the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) Congress 2022.1 Additionally, after 4 weeks of nivolumab plus ipilimumab, 67% of patients with...
In a study reported in JAMA Network Open, Christopher R. Manz, MD, MSHP, and colleagues found that oncologist participation in the Medicare Oncology Care Model (OCM) was not associated with a reduced likelihood of prescribing novel cancer therapies to their patients. As stated by the investigators, ...
Qinjin Fan, PhD, of the American Cancer Society, explores the question of how mortgage discrimination is linked to lower rates of guideline-concordant care for patients with non–small cell lung cancer. This study highlights the critical need to understand the pathways through which mortgage denials ...
In a study reported in JAMA Oncology, Hu et al found decreases in the rates of opiate prescription and potential misuse/substance use disorders among survivors of childhood cancer following the March 2016 release of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) opioid-prescribing guideline....
In an analysis of National Cancer Database data reported in JAMA Surgery, Nassoiy et al found that neoadjuvant chemoradiation therapy followed by surgery was associated with higher rates of R0 resection and improved survival vs other treatments in patients aged 80 and older undergoing surgery for...
The addition of 24 months of androgen-deprivation therapy to postoperative radiotherapy after radical prostatectomy provided a metastasis-free survival benefit and improved the time to salvage therapy in patients with prostate cancer, according to the preliminary results from the RADICALS-HD trial...
The cost of cancer treatment may negatively impact the physical and mental health of survivors who are living in poverty, according to a recent study published by Coughlin et al in the Journal of Oncology Practice. The findings provide important information about the impact social determinants may...
Although breast cancer death rates dropped by 43% from 1989 to 2020, Black women continue to be 40% more likely to die of the disease, despite a lower incidence, according to findings outlined in the American Cancer Society’s report Breast Cancer Statistics, 2022, and a companion study published by ...
Just 1 month after the DESTINY-Breast04 data were presented at the 2022 ASCO Annual Meeting Plenary Session,1 an ASCO expert panel released updated guidance that endorses the adoption of the antibody-drug conjugate fam-trastuzumab deruxtecan-nxki (T-DXd) into clinical practice for patients with...
On June 24, 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court announced its decision in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization, effectively eliminating the constitutional right to abortion and returning the power to regulate reproductive health to individual states. Some states have already taken action to...
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...
Although standard therapies may provide long-lasting remissions for many patients with various subtypes of lymphoma, there is a critical need for new strategies for the sizable high-risk subset. At the 2022 Pan Pacific Lymphoma Conference, four experts in the field described future therapies for...
Kelly Dooley, MD, PhD, MPH, has been appointed Addison B. Scoville Jr. Professor of Medicine and Director of the Division of Infectious Diseases in the Department of Medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC). Dr. Dooley comes to Vanderbilt from The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in...
Jonathan Ledermann, MD, of UCL Cancer Institute University College London, was the formal discussant of both the phase III SOLO1 and PAOLA-1 trials. He was quite enthusiastic about SOLO1: “Perhaps, this is really cure we are seeing.” He also noted that overall survival is still immature and is...
First-line maintenance therapy with olaparib extended survival beyond historical expectations in some women with newly diagnosed advanced ovarian cancer, according to two phase III studies presented at the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) 2022 Congress.1,2 In the SOLO1 trial,1 more...
TROPiCS-02 is a statistically positive trial, with the primary endpoint met and also now with an overall survival gain of 3.2 months,” said the study’s invited discussant Meritxell Bellet Ezquerra, MD, PhD, a senior researcher at the Vall d’Hebron Institute of Oncology, Barcelona. “TROPiCS-02 is...
An overall survival benefit has now emerged for sacituzumab govitecan-hziy in women with previously treated, hormone receptor–positive/HER2-negative, locally recurrent, inoperable or metastatic breast cancer, according to a planned second interim analysis of the phase III TROPiCS-02 trial.1 The...
Formal discussant of the KEYNOTE-189 and KEYNOTE-407 trials, Mary O’Brien, MD, Head of the Lung Unit, Royal Marsden Hospital, NHS Foundation Trust, London, found that both studies showed consistent gains in overall and progression-free survival with pembrolizumab/chemotherapy, but she expressed...
Formal discussant of this study, Suzette Delaloge, MD, MSc, of Gustave Roussy, Villejuif, France, stated: “This is a big step forward and an amazing set of new knowledge. This presentation is a meaningful demonstration of the role of PM2.5 [particulate matter 2.5 µm in diameter] air pollutants in...
Although air pollution is associated with lung cancer, not much has been known about how one leads to the other. For the first time, researchers have identified a mechanism by which particulate matter in the air triggers non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) in people who have never smoked. Moreover,...
Primary central nervous system lymphoma (PCNSL) accounts for less than 1% of all non-Hodgkin lymphomas and between 3% and 4% of all brain tumors, with an age-adjusted incidence rate of four cases per million persons per year. Approximately 1,500 new cases are diagnosed each year in the United...
The legal climate surrounding reproductive health care and fertility preservation has changed drastically since the June 2022 Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v Wade, which revoked the constitutional right to abortion. With this ruling, individual state legislatures are now able to pass laws...
The results of SWOG S18011 were met with enthusiasm by attendees at the Presidential Symposium of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) Congress 2022. The ASCO Post captured the thoughts of several melanoma experts, who had somewhat different ideas about the immediate clinical...
In resectable stage III to IV melanoma, three cycles of neoadjuvant pembrolizumab followed by adjuvant pembrolizumab was significantly more beneficial than adjuvant pembrolizumab alone, based on the results of the phase II SWOG S1801 trial presented in a Presidential Symposium at the European...
For anacademic oncologist, there is no greater reward than to be part of the clinical research that turns a fatal cancer into a highly treatable disease. Saul A. Rosenberg, MD, FASCO, was one such researcher who pioneered advances in the diagnosis, treatment, and understanding of lymphoma,...
After my first breast cancer diagnosis, in 2010, the odds for a cure were seemingly all weighted in my favor. A routine mammogram screening had picked up a small—less than 1 cm—mass in my right breast, and a tissue biopsy confirmed it was stage I estrogen receptor–positive breast cancer. I had no...
1980–1995, Villejeuf: Claud Jasmin, MD, advocates for the elimination of chronologic age from the eligibility criteria for clinical trials of cancer treatment. In 1995, Dr. Jasmin published a book entitled La Planète Blanche [The White Planet], where he foresaw challenges in a world crowded with...
With the aging of the world population, geriatric oncology is becoming a mainstay. Over the past year in The ASCO Post, we published a couple of articles on the history of oncology, including one on the history of geriatric oncology in the United States and Europe. Our goal was to promote a...
In the more than 7 months since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, cancer care for Ukrainian citizens has changed dramatically. Ukraine was once a country able to provide its approximately 160,000 newly diagnosed patients with cancer each year with modern diagnostic methods, including...
Sarah Cannon, the Cancer Institute of HCA Healthcare, announced recently that Stephen A. Strickland, Jr, MD, MSCI, has been named the Director of Leukemia Research for the Transplant & Cellular Therapy Network. In this role, Dr. Strickland provides scientific leadership and oversees Sarah...
Scott M. Welford, PhD, Professor and Biology Division Chief in Radiation Oncology at Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, will lead the center’s Tumor Biology Research Program with Wael El-Rifai, MD, PhD, Associate Director of Basic Science at ...
Shaji K. Kumar, MD, an expert in multiple myeloma and monoclonal gammopathies, has been appointed to the position of Editor-in-Chief of The Hematologist: ASH News and Reports, the official member news magazine of the American Society of Hematology (ASH). As the seventh Editor-in-Chief of the...
Reshma Jagsi, MD, DPhil, FASCO, recently joined Emory School of Medicine as Chair of the Department of Radiation Oncology. Dr. Jagsi was formerly the Newman Family Professor, Deputy Chair, and Residency Program Director in the Department of Radiation Oncology and Director of the Center for...
After a nearly 20-year wait, the results are finally in: sublobar surgery has been found to be noninferior to lobectomy and may be the new standard of care of patients with small, early-stage non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Results of the phase III Alliance trial, presented at the International ...
On this episode, we’re highlighting speakers who presented data in skin cancer during the ESMO Congress 2022, including findings on tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte therapy in advanced melanoma, cemiplimab in cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma, and the association of circulating tumor DNA and disease...
The addition of cabozantinib to nivolumab plus ipilimumab prolonged progression-free survival in untreated intermediate-risk patients with advanced renal cell carcinoma (RCC), according to the first results of the phase III COSMIC-313 trial. These findings were presented as a Presidential Symposium ...
Survivors of prostate cancer originally diagnosed with metastatic disease may experience significantly worse health-related quality of life than those diagnosed with early-stage disease and individuals without a cancer history across all domains, according to a new study by Zheng et al published in ...
In a U.S. cross-sectional study reported in JACC:CardioOncology, Ganatra et al found that mortality from comorbid cancer and cardiovascular disease was significantly higher in counties with higher vs lower social vulnerability (ie, age greater than vs less than 45, male vs female sex, Black vs...
As reported in JAMA Oncology by Olson et al, the primary toxicity results of the phase II SABR-5 trial have shown a low rate of toxic effects with stereotactic ablative radiotherapy (SABR) for patients with up to five oligometastases. As stated by the investigators: “After the publication of the...
In an analysis from the International PPB/DICER1 Registry reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Schultz et al found that chemotherapy with IVADo (ifosfamide, vincristine, actinomycin-D, and doxorubicin) appeared to be associated with similar or improved outcomes vs historical controls among ...