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Showing 601 - 650Living with the Aftermath of Breast Cancer
My battle with breast cancer began 10 years ago, but the aftereffects of the disease and the treatment will be with me for the rest of my life. As a professional woman who has had several diverse careers, including one as a corporate controller and another as an art teacher, I’m driven to want to...
ASCO University’s e-Seminars Offer a Stimulating Way to Stay on Top of Trends as Well as Meeting Highlights
Did you miss one of the symposia this year and need to quickly catch up on the highlights in small, digestible portions? No problem. ASCO University’s e-Seminar series now has you covered. Or, is there a new journal article that everyone’s talking about, and you need guidance on how to interpret...
Clinicians to Benefit from New JCO Initiatives
Journal of Clinical Oncology (JCO) has recently launched several new features for readers under the direction of Stephen A. Cannistra, MD, who began his tenure as Editor-in-Chief in June 2011. These initiatives include the creation of two new article types: Rapid Communications (RC) and...
Maintenance of Certification: One Size Should Not Fit All
After a conference call and having returned several phone calls, I again opened my ASCO Medical Oncology Self Evaluation Program (SEP) book hoping to steal an hour to reread the chapter on multiple myeloma, and begin digging deeper into head and neck cancer. It was March 2011, and my Maintenance of ...
Being Well Informed Helped Me Cope with Breast Cancer
I had been putting off getting a screening mammogram for a few years. When I finally made an appointment in March 2011 and was told that I needed a follow-up sonogram because the test had picked up a suspicious-looking mass in my right breast, I knew I was in trouble. A biopsy of the tumor showed...
Expert Point of View: Sergio Giralt, MD
Sergio Giralt, MD, Chief of Adult Bone Marrow Transplant Service at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York, commented on the findings by Papanikolaou et al presented at the 2012 ASCO Annual Meeting. “To put this trial into context, in a recent study of 283 double-refractory multiple...
Dying Patients with Cancer Who Avoid Aggressive Care but Stay Connected with an Oncologist Have Better Quality of Life
Dying patients with cancer who avoided hospitalizations and life-prolonging measures, who worried less, prayed or meditated, were visited by a pastor, and maintained a therapeutic alliance with their oncologist had the highest quality of life at the end of life, according to a study recently...
Starting Over after Cancer Treatment
When bloody discharge started oozing from the nipple on my left breast, I knew instinctively that it was serious. Although I was just 43, having lost two aunts to breast cancer, I knew my family history increased my risk for developing the disease. So when I saw my gynecologist for an exam, I was...
Tweeting at ASCO Annual Meetings Can Enhance the Experience
Tweeting at concerts or plays may earn you scornful looks or even stern warnings from ushers, but tweeting at the ASCO Annual Meeting may enhance the meeting experience for you and others. In a study comparing trends in Twitter use by physicians during the 2010 and 2011 ASCO Annual Meetings, some...
Feminist Author Babette Rosmond Helped Propel the Adoption of Patients’ Rights to Choose Their Cancer Treatment
Then writer and editor Babette Rosmond was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1971, the second wave of the Women’s Liberation Movement that began in the mid-1960s was in its infancy. Still, when told by her doctor that she would need a radical mastectomy—a procedure developed by William Stewart...
Karnofsky Award Winner Honors Mentors through Gift to Conquer Cancer Foundation
Kanti R. Rai, MD, and his wife Susan have been loyal donors to the Conquer Cancer Foundation for the past 9 years, but in 2012, a momentous occasion in his career inspired Dr. Rai to make a unique gift. A Moment of Reflection In the spring of 2012, Dr. Rai, an internationally recognized expert on ...
I Am Not a Victim
Six years ago, at age 62, I was feeling in great shape. The year before, I had taken over custody of my 2- and 3-year-old great-grandchildren and decided to change the course of my career from motivational speaker to motivational coach to be home more often with the kids. It was during one of our...
I’m Not the Same Person I Was before Cancer
It’s not clear to me—and my doctors can’t say with any certainty—whether taking birth control pills for many years had anything to do with my getting breast cancer 3 years ago, at age 44. But the cancer growing in my left breast was diagnosed as stage I, estrogen receptor–positive. Although I never ...
Are We Winning the War on Cancer?
On December 23, 1971, President Richard Nixon signed the U.S. National Cancer Act. This date is widely considered to mark the beginning of the so-called “War on Cancer,” although that phrase was introduced only later on. Over recent decades, journalists have from time to time questioned whether we...
E-mail Reminders to Providers May Improve Documentation of Code Status in Patients with Advanced Disease
E-mail reminders to providers at the start of each new chemotherapy regimen may improve the rate and timing of code status documentation for patients with advanced lung cancer, according to a study in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. Jennifer S. Temel, MD, and colleagues from Massachusetts General ...
Oncology Trailblazer James F. Holland, MD, Recalls a Time of Unbridled Scientific Excitement
James F. Holland, MD, began his journey into oncology when it was still a nascent discipline, working alongside groundbreaking pioneers in the field such as Drs. Emil “Tom” Frei and C. Gordon Zubrod. Dr. Holland recently shared a glimpse of his role in oncology’s formative years with The ASCO Post. ...
Young Investigator Award's Humble Beginnings Mark the Start of Something Big
Judith Kaur, MD, was presented with the very first Young Investigator Award (YIA) at the 1984 ASCO Annual Meeting in Toronto in what she felt was a “very prestigious event”—having breakfast with the ASCO president. The purpose of the new YIA program was to provide grant funding to help a young...
Sequestration Will Have Shattering Impact on Entire U.S. Cancer Enterprise
March 1 marked the beginning of sequestration, the unprecedented automatic budget cuts that immediately take effect across the federal government—after months of futile negotiations by the President and Congress. Sequestration will have a shattering impact on the entire cancer enterprise in the...
NCI Guide Helps Providers Get Adolescent and Young Adult Patients Involved in End-of-life Care
Enabling adolescent and young adult (AYA) patients to become involved in advance care planning can help parents and health-care agents make informed decisions, alleviate distress, and possibly improve the patients’ quality of life, according to researchers at the National Cancer Institute’s...
It Takes a Village to Survive Ovarian Cancer
My odyssey with ovarian cancer started in May 2005, when I saw my gynecologist for an annual exam and mentioned an odd twinge I had been experiencing on my left side. A subsequent pelvic ultrasound followed by an MRI showed that my ovaries were enlarged, and my doctor warned me that the problem...
C. Everett Koop, MD, Surgeon General Under Ronald Reagan, Dies at 96
Appointed by the President and called “America’s Doctor,” the Surgeon General’s chief task is to protect and advance the health of the nation. Most of our Surgeon Generals have tiptoed around hot-button public health issues that might bruise political sensibilities and their own careers. C....
Acts of Kindness Were Key to My Survival
Just 1 month after undergoing a mammogram that was deemed normal with some dense tissue in my left breast, my gynecologist felt a mass in that breast about the size of a cherry tomato during a routine well visit. After watching the lump for a month to see if it was cyclical, she sent me for another ...
Emil 'Tom' Frei III, MD, Trailblazer in the Development of Combination Chemotherapy, Dies at 89
The pages of medical history are dog-eared with breakthroughs that have transformed medicine and saved lives. One of those dog-eared pages belongs to Emil Frei III, MD, known to his colleagues and friends as Tom. In the dawn of oncology, Dr. Frei, along with his associate, Emil Freireich, MD, did...
Living with the Fear of Cancer
After a friend was diagnosed with breast cancer, I became so worried it would happen to me, I decided to perform regular breast self-exams so I could familiarize myself with the normal feel of my breasts, and quickly spot any changes. My friend’s diagnosis scared me, and that fear probably saved my ...
Sequestration's Impact on Cancer Care
On March 1, the deficit-budget mechanism known as sequestration took effect, triggering $85 billion in across-the-board cuts to most federal agencies over the remaining 7 months in fiscal year 2013. The total federal deficit reduction budget under the Budget Control Act of 2011 calls for $1.2...
More Recollections on Emil 'Tom' Frei III, MD
I have read with interest the recent tributes to Emil “Tom” Frei III, MD, who passed away in April. I was backstage at the ASCO Annual Meeting in 1981, when Dr. Frei was giving his Karnofsky acceptance address. I had a slide presentation at the combined ASCO/American Association for Cancer Research ...
Caring for the Whole Patient Both during Active Treatment and at End of Life
Despite studies showing that a majority of patients prefer to die at home rather than in an institutional setting,1 in many parts of the country, over 30% die in nursing homes and over 50% die in hospitals, according to Ira Byock, MD, Director of Palliative Medicine, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical...
Emil 'Tom' Frei III, MD 1924–2013
The pages of medical history are dog-eared with breakthroughs that have transformed medicine and saved lives. One of those dog-eared pages belongs to Emil Frei III, MD, known to his colleagues and friends as Tom. In the dawn of oncology, Dr. Frei, along with his associate, Emil Freireich, MD, did...
Treating Both the Physical and Psychological Symptoms of Cancer
A growing number of people with cancer are being treated on an outpatient basis. At the Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center of New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center in New York, to ensure that the psychosocial and psychiatric needs of these patients were being...
Despite a Recurrence, I'm Not Surrendering My Life to Cancer
This is the first time I’m going public with the fact that I have advanced ovarian cancer. I thought I could avoid the fate of my mother and her mother, both of whom died of ovarian cancer in their 50s, and live well past my 60s and even 70s. But at 58, I’ve had to accept that that is not likely. I ...
Most Patients Receiving Radiotherapy for Incurable Lung Cancer Do Not Realize It Is Unlikely to Cure Them
Surveying a population-based and health system–based cohort of patients receiving radiation therapy for incurable lung cancer (defined as stage IV or stage IIIB with malignant effusion at diagnosis) revealed that “64% did not understand that [radiotherapy] was not at all likely to cure them.” These ...
I Have No Fear
I found out that I had stage III pancreatic cancer on Valentine’s Day in 2011, but I think the disease may have been brewing for a long time. For 19 years, I had experienced intermittent pain in the right upper quadrant of my abdomen. I had gallbladder surgery to relieve a bile duct obstruction,...
Examining the Role Genetics Plays in Breast Cancer Onset
Internationally known for her research in the molecular genetics of cancer, Olufunmilayo I. Olopade, MD, FACP, first became interested in oncology during medical school in Nigeria, where she cared for patients with Burkitt’s lymphoma. After moving to Chicago in 1983 to continue her medical...
Déjà Vu Redux: Lessons from the SWOG-8516 Study in Aggressive Lymphomas
Joseph M. Connors, MD, authored a commentary in the June 25 issue of The ASCO Post inspired by a recent New England Journal of Medicine publication on dose-adjusted EPOCH-R chemotherapy (etoposide, prednisone, vincristine, cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, and rituximab) for primary mediastinal B-cell ...
I Overcame Cervical Cancer but Not Its Long-term Effects
In 1979, when I was just 35 years old, I started experiencing abnormal vaginal bleeding and lower back pain. When a Pap test came back normal, the gynecologist I saw said not to worry about anything, that I was fine. But I wasn’t fine. My symptoms quickly escalated, and I sought the opinion of...
New Campaign Addresses Rise in Young-onset Colon Cancer
The Colon Cancer Alliance has partnered with Bowel Cancer UK and the Colon Cancer Prevention Project to launch the international Never Too Young awareness campaign, addressing the rise in young-onset (younger than 50 years) colon cancer diagnoses and mortality rates. This global collaboration comes ...
Tecemotide Vaccine Warrants Further Study in Unresectable Stage III Non–Small Cell Lung Cancer
Results of the START trial suggest that maintenance therapy with the investigational immunotherapy tecemotide (formerly known as L-BLP25) may have a role in the treatment of patients with unresectable stage III non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Although there was no significant overall survival...
Conquer Cancer Foundation Donor and ASCO Member Denis Hammond, MD: Spreading the Word to Help Conquer Cancer
Oncology care professionals answer hundreds of questions from patients and their families every day. Over the course of months and years doctors and nurses address everything from medical questions about drug regimens and side effects, to personal questions about how cancer may affect work or...
Dr. Julie Vose Finds the Best of Both Worlds—Patient Care and Cutting-Edge Research—in Academic Medicine
Julie M. Vose, MD, MBA, is the Neumann M. and Mildred E. Harris Professor and Chief of the Division of Hematology/Oncology at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. She grew up in Mitchell, South Dakota, a small town nestled on the banks of the James River. Mitchell is home to the Corn Palace,...
Pemetrexed Maintenance in PARAMOUNT: Continuation Proves to Be a Strong Option for Advanced NSCLC, Although Not a Mandate
The PARAMOUNT trial1 represents an important landmark study of continuation maintenance therapy with pemetrexed (Alimta). While maintenance therapy gained a toehold in routine management of advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) several years ago, the first trials that demonstrated a...
Access to and Appropriate Use of Oncology Drugs Called Into Question by ASCO Studies
Studies presented at this year’s ASCO Annual Meeting suggest that despite the wealth of amazing oncolytics on the market, drug shortages persist, drug substitutions are common, off-label use of drugs occurs frequently, and patients find their costs burdensome. Drug Shortage Persists The shortage of ...
Long-Term Androgen Deprivation in Patients With Intermediate-Risk Prostate Cancer Does Not Improve Overall Survival
Men with advanced prostate cancer typically receive hormonal therapy to reduce the level of androgens in their bodies. Although hormone therapy alone will not cure prostate cancer, lowering androgen levels can reduce the size of prostate tumors or stall their growth. A secondary analysis of the...
Jean B. Owen, PhD, Named 2013 ASTRO Honorary Member at Annual Meeting
The American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO) selected health-care researcher Jean B. Owen, PhD, as the 2013 Honorary Member, the highest honor ASTRO bestows on distinguished cancer researchers, scientists, and leaders in disciplines other than radiation oncology, radiobiology, and radiation...
ASCO Releases Statement on the Impact of the Government Shutdown on Cancer Care
All nonessential government services were suspended at midnight on October 1, 2013, after Congress failed to reach a budget compromise to keep the government funded before the start of the new fiscal year beginning on October 1, 2013. ASCO issued a statement in response to the government shutdown...
Intralesional Cytokine Therapy in Cutaneous Melanoma: A Call for Clinical Trials
Cutaneous melanomas are mostly an immunogenic group of tumors, but they are also heterogeneous. Therefore, therapeutic specificity and autogenetic approaches are essential to secure beneficial results. The objective of sentinel lymph node biopsy, at the time of diagnosis, is to identify patients...
Claudia I. Henschke, PhD, MD, Took a Circuitous Route to Her Groundbreaking Work in Lung Cancer Screening
“Once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return.” —Leonardo da Vinci Lung cancer CT screening may have had no greater advocate than Claudia I. Henschke, PhD, MD. In the face of...
Having Breast Cancer Has Actually Been a Positive Experience
I know it sounds strange, but being diagnosed with cancer was one of the best things to have happened to me. I don’t mean to diminish the traumatic experience of hearing the words, “You have breast cancer.” That was over 11 years ago, and I’m still reeling from the diagnosis and its aftereffects....
The Power of Human Attachment
For those patients with cancer who may be single, widowed, separated, or divorced, those for whom a natural social support system may be weak, the role of the cancer support group should not be overlooked. In leading a previous trial of supportive-expressive group therapy as a key pathway to foster ...
SIDEBAR: Expect Questions About Support Systems for Unmarried Patients
The study finding that unmarried patients with cancer “are at significantly higher risk of presentation with metastatic cancer, undertreatment, and death resulting from their cancer,” generated a lot of comments from colleagues, family members, and patients, the study’s lead author Ayal A. Aizer,...
Neoadjuvant Treatment of Early Breast Cancer
INSIDE THE BLACK BOX is an occasional column providing insight into the FDA and its policies and procedures. In this first installment, FDA Clinical Reviewers Laleh Amiri-Kordestani, MD, and Suparna Wedam, MD, discuss FDA’s recent approval of pertuzumab (Perjeta) for the neoadjuvant treatment of...
