On July 6, the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), an organization representing a membership of over 50,000 oncologists, cancer scientists, other health-care professionals, and patient advocates, issued the following statement. AACR is deeply concerned about the ramifications of the...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Copeland et al, the phase III Gynecologic Oncology Group 0212/NRG Oncology study has shown no improvement in overall survival with maintenance paclitaxel or paclitaxel poliglumex vs surveillance in patients with advanced ovarian, tubal, or...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Jonathan E. Rosenberg, MD, and colleagues, the phase II BAYOU trial has shown no improvement in progression-free survival with the addition of the poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor olaparib to the anti–PD-L1 agent durvalumab in...
In a U.S. “real-world” retrospective cohort study of patients receiving first-line treatment for mantle cell lymphoma reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Peter Martin, MD, and colleagues found that autologous stem cell transplantation (ASCT) did not significantly improve the time to next...
The all-oral combination of dabrafenib plus trametinib—two targeted therapies—significantly improved the overall response rate vs standard-of-care chemotherapy with carboplatin plus vincristine in pediatric patients with BRAF V600 mutation–positive low-grade gliomas. The clinical benefit rate...
Data from the world’s largest prostate cancer screening study provides further evidence to support the introduction of a targeted screening program for the disease, said researchers. In 2009, the European Randomised Study of Screening for Prostate Cancer (ERSPC) showed that screening can reduce...
Researchers have found a significant difference in the gut microbiota of patients with prostate cancer compared with those who have benign biopsies. Although the finding is an association, it could partly explain the relationship between lifestyle effects and geographic differences in prostate...
Opioids are a cornerstone of cancer pain management, but there is a lack of consensus on how to treat pain patients with cancer who also have struggled with opioid use disorder or prescription opioid misuse. In a study published by Fitzgerald Jones et al in JAMA Oncology, researchers outlined...
As reported in JAMA Oncology by Stein et al, the German phase II INTEGA trial showed improved survival with the addition of modified FOLFOX6 (fluorouracil, leucovorin, oxaliplatin) vs the addition of ipilimumab to trastuzumab/nivolumab in the first-line treatment of patients with advanced or...
As reported in The Lancet by Manali Kamdar, MD, and colleagues, an interim analysis of the phase III TRANSFORM trial has shown significantly improved event-free survival with second-line lisocabtagene maraleucel vs standard-of-care salvage immunochemotherapy followed by autologous hematopoietic...
The invited discussant of PARADIGM, Chiara Cremolini, MD, PhD, Professor of Medical Oncology at the University of Pisa, Italy, said the findings prospectively confirm the superior benefit of FOLFOX (fluorouracil, leucovorin, oxaliplatin) paired with panitumumab rather than bevacizumab in RAS...
The preferred targeted therapy for left-sided RAS wild-type metastatic colorectal cancer, in combination with standard chemotherapy, is panitumumab, not bevacizumab, based on a head-to-head comparison in the phase III PARADIGM trial. Panitumumab plus chemotherapy yielded the longest overall...
In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Francesca Gany, MD, MS, and colleagues found that food interventions were associated with high rates of cancer treatment completion rates among food-insecure patients in New York City (NYC). Study Details The study included 117 patients with...
In a prospective single-institution study reported in JAMA Oncology, Giacomo Montagna, MD, MPH, and colleagues found that the risk for breast cancer–related lymphedema after axillary lymph node dissection was increased in Black and Hispanic patients, those who received neoadjuvant chemotherapy, and ...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is warning that results from the phase III DUO clinical trial show a possible increased risk of death with duvelisib compared to ofatumumab among patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) or small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL). The trial also found...
In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Bertamini et al found that higher levels of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) at diagnosis were associated with poorer progression-free and overall survival in transplant-eligible patients with newly diagnosed multiple myeloma. The prognostic...
In 2020, nearly 150,000 Americans, mostly those aged 50 and older, were diagnosed with colorectal cancer. However, about 18,000 of those individuals were younger than age 50. And while colorectal cancer rates have decreased for people over age 50, they have been increasing by 51% since 1994 for...
The treatment of breast cancer abounding in the protein HER2 was revolutionized with the introduction of drugs like trastuzumab that target the protein. When researchers discovered that breast cancers with lower levels of HER2 often respond to a trastuzumab-and-chemotherapy drug conjugate, they...
In a Dutch study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Klatte et al provided findings from a 20-year follow-up of a pancreatic cancer surveillance program including carriers of germline CDKN2A pathogenic variants. Study Details The study included 347 carriers in the Netherlands who...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Merli et al, the Fondazione Italiana Linfomi phase II BArT study has shown that primary treatment of hepatitis C virus (HCV)-associated indolent non-Hodgkin lymphomas with direct-acting antivirals resulted in sustained virologic response in all...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Howell et al, the phase II FAKTION trial has shown improved overall survival with the addition of the AKT inhibitor capivasertib to fulvestrant in patients with estrogen receptor–positive, HER2-negative advanced breast cancer who experienced disease relapse or...
Invited discussant Ernst Lengyel, MD, PhD, of University of Chicago Medicine, found the results of ATHENA-MONO promising. “I think it is encouraging that in the BRCA-mutation subgroup of patients, we see such a clear increase in progression-free survival compared to the intention-to-treat...
Maintenance therapy with the poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor rucaparib led to a significant improvement in progression-free survival compared with placebo in patients with newly diagnosed advanced ovarian cancer who responded to first-line platinum-based chemotherapy. The...
On June 24, the editors of The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) published an editorial online in response to the U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS) decision in the case of Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health Organization. The Court held in a vote of 5 to 4 that the Constitution of the United States does...
Ben Creelan, MD, Associate Member of Moffitt Cancer Center, Tampa, Florida, provided some context for the CHRYSALIS study. “This dual bispecific antibody targeting both EGFR and MET clearly has potent single-agent activity in patients with MET exon 14 skipping NSCLC,” he said. “For now, it is not...
Dual targeting with the bispecific antibody amivantamab-vmjw showed antitumor activity and tolerability in patients with metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and MET exon 14 skipping mutations, according to results of the ongoing phase I CHRYSALIS study.1,2 Updated results were presented...
Patients with cancer have received priority status to receive COVID-19 vaccinations, but limited data are available regarding the safety and efficacy of the vaccines for patients treated with immune checkpoint inhibitors for lung cancer. Now, a new study published by Hibino et al in the Journal of...
In the German phase II PETRARCA trial of the AIO EGA Study Group, reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Hofheinz et al found that the addition of trastuzumab and pertuzumab to perioperative FLOT (fluorouracil, leucovorin, oxaliplatin, and docetaxel) improved both the pathologic complete...
In a phase IIb study reported in The Lancet Oncology, Ehdaie et al found that focal ablation with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)-guided focused ultrasound successfully treated a high proportion of patients with grade group 2 or 3 prostate cancer. As stated by the investigators, “Men with grade...
In a cohort study reported in JAMA, Karla Kerlikowske, MD, and colleagues found that screening with digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT) vs digital mammography was not associated with a lower risk of interval invasive breast cancer and was associated with a reduced risk of diagnosis of advanced...
The national advocacy group Children’s Cancer Cause, which plays a leadership role in advocacy and training on national issues affecting childhood cancer, has established an annual $10,000 award, the Survivorship Champion’s Prize, to be presented to a group, program, or institution making...
A new report led by researchers at the American Cancer Society (ACS) in collaboration with the National Cancer Institute (NCI) shows more than 18 million Americans (8.3 million males and 9.7 million females) with a history of cancer were living in the United States as of January 1, 2022, with a...
Black and Asian women are more likely than White women to experience significant delays in getting breast biopsies after a mammogram identifies an abnormality. Moreover, those delays appear to be influenced by screening site–specific factors that may stem from structural racism, according to...
In an analysis of the KEYNOTE-048 trial reported in a research letter in JAMA Oncology, Yu et al identified outcomes with pembrolizumab alone or combined with chemotherapy vs cetuximab plus chemotherapy in patients with recurrent or metastatic head and neck squamous cell carcinoma with a low or...
Invited discussant of the DETERMINATION trial, Joseph Mikhael, MD, MEd, Professor of Applied Cancer Research and Drug Discovery at the Translational Genomics Research Institute, City of Hope Cancer Center, described the many implications of the important findings for DETERMINATION and offered some ...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Saro H. Armenian, DO, MPH, and colleagues, findings from the BMT Survivor Study (BMTSS) indicated that survivors of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) treated with blood or marrow transplantation (BMT) are at a markedly increased risk of...
In the phase III DETERMINATION trial, progression-free survival was significantly improved with triplet induction therapy and early transplantation in newly diagnosed patients with multiple myeloma, but overall survival at 5 years was similar to the nontransplant approach.1 The findings were...
On June 27, the Biden Administration, through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), announced a new model aimed at improving cancer care for Medicare patients and lowering health-care costs. CMS’ Center for Medicare and...
On June 27, ASCO released a statement on the recent ruling in Dobbs v Jackson Women’s Health. ASCO is committed to the delivery of medically appropriate, equitable, evidence-based cancer care. For patients of child-bearing age, a cancer diagnosis raises medical considerations around pregnancy and...
Our growing knowledge of the molecular and genomic drivers of cancer has translated into a robust pipeline of promising anticancer agents. However, bringing new drugs from the lab to the patient with cancer can be frustratingly slow. To that end, the accelerated approval system was created by the...
The group of compounds called parabens, which are found in widely used hair and personal care products, may increase breast cancer risk in Black women—more so than in White women—according to a study presented at ENDO 2022, the Endocrine Society’s Annual Meeting. One in eight women in the United...
Women who are longer-term survivors of metastatic breast cancer may have a worse survival rate if they have diabetes and poorly controlled blood sugar levels, according to a new study presented at ENDO 2022, the Endocrine Society’s Annual Meeting. This is the first study to specifically examine the ...
On June 24, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy lisocabtagene maraleucel (Breyanzi) for adult patients with large B-cell lymphoma (LBCL) who have disease refractory to first-line chemoimmunotherapy or relapse within 12 months of...
In a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Garcés et al found that increasing levels of circulating tumor cells (CTCs) at diagnosis were associated with poorer outcomes in newly diagnosed patients with transplant-eligible multiple myeloma, and that inclusion of CTCs in a risk model...
Hearing the words “You have cancer” is a devastating blow, especially when the biggest health issues you’ve had to contend with over more than 6 decades are common colds and knee and hip replacements. But in 2017, the symptoms I thought were from a lingering summer cold drove me to seek medical...
On May 27, 2022, nivolumab was approved for use in combination with fluoropyrimidine- and platinum-based chemotherapy and in combination with ipilimumab for the first-line treatment of advanced or metastatic esophageal squamous cell carcinoma.1 Supporting Efficacy Data Approval was based on...
Radiation therapy has long been one of the three pillars of cancer therapy—surgery, chemotherapy, and radiotherapy—only recently joined by what is widely considered a fourth pillar, immunotherapy. In part 1 of this two-part report, we trace the beginnings of radiation oncology in the United...
In March 2022, Kristeleit et al reported the results of the ARIEL4 trial1 of rucaparib in relapsed BRCA-mutant ovarian cancer in The Lancet Oncology (summarized in this issue of The ASCO Post) and are to be congratulated on this accomplishment. This report, along with the almost simultaneous...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Rebecca Kristeleit, MD, of Guy’s and St. Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, and colleagues, the phase III ARIEL4 trial has shown a statistically significant improvement in progression-free survival with rucaparib vs chemotherapy in relapsed ovarian cancer with...
In this installment of Living a Full Life, Guest Editor Jame Abraham, MD, FACP, spoke with Ariela L. Marshall, MD, Director, Women’s Hemostasis and Thrombosis Program at Penn Medicine. Along with her clinical and research activities, Dr. Marshall is also an advocate for women’s health and equity in ...