Stand Up To Cancer (SU2C) is making $7.5 million in research grants available to early-career scientists who are pursuing innovative cancer research projects focusing on immuno-oncology, the American Association for Cancer Research recently announced. Funded by a grant from SU2C Visionary...
Breast cancer researcher Adrian Lee, PhD, has been named Director of the Institute for Precision Medicine (IPM), a joint effort by the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) and the University of Pittsburgh to move biomedical research into personalized well-being and clinical care. Dr....
An article in The New York Times about women who had chosen not to have reconstruction following breast cancer surgery might prompt questions from newly diagnosed patients considering their options.1 Deanna J. Attai, MD, FACS, told The ASCO Post that whenever an article on breast cancer appears in...
A “nascent movement to ‘go flat’” is how an article in The New York Times characterized the decisions by some women to opt out of reconstruction following surgery for breast cancer.1 The article examined the reasons several patients made that decision, which included avoiding multiple surgeries and ...
It was 1983, and I was in my third year as an attending physician at a major East Coast university medical center and just 5 years out of fellowship. As was common at the time, I saw and treated all malignancies except leukemia and gynecologic cancers. In the middle of a typically busy day at the ...
A pooled analysis of outcomes in patients receiving nivolumab (Opdivo) or nivolumab plus ipilimumab (Yervoy) for advanced mucosal or cutaneous melanoma in clinical trials was reported by D’Angelo et al in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. The pooled analysis involved 889 patients who...
Shirley A. Johnson, RN, MS, MBA, has been appointed as Roswell Park Cancer Institute’s Senior Vice President of Nursing and Patient Care Services and Chief Nursing Officer. Ms. Johnson officially joined the Roswell Park staff on October 31, 2016, bringing with her nearly 25 years of experience in...
The American Society of Hematology (ASH) will honor Zhu Chen, MD, PhD, of Shanghai Institute of Hematology, and Hugues de Thé, MD, PhD, of Collège de France, with the 2016 Ernest Beutler Lecture and Prize for their significant research advances in the area of acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL)....
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Lifespan—Rhode Island’s first health system—leadership have signed a memorandum of understanding to form a partnership that will advance cancer treatment and expand research. The details will be finalized early next year. “Over the past 6 months, our staff members...
It was mid-morning, and I was walking along one of the long corridors in our hospital, attending to clinical duties. From a distance, I noticed this elderly couple walking in the opposite direction. As we got closer, it became obvious that the elderly gentleman appeared winded and was looking...
It should not come as a surprise to anyone who has read Dr. Paul Kalanithi’s brilliant—and unforgettable—memoir, When Breath Becomes Air (Random House, 2016), that nearly a year after publication, it remains on The New York Times best-seller list, its popularity only increasing with time. Written...
A randomized phase II clinical trial evaluating cabozantinib (Cabometyx) compared with standard-of-care sunitinib (Sutent) as first-line therapy for patients with advanced renal cell carcinoma has found that cabozantinib reduced the rate of disease progression or death by 34% compared with...
Next to me sounds the buzzing of my Lympha Press machine, which substitutes for the constant visits of the physiotherapist who performs the lymph drainage. This gives me more freedom, and we have more privacy at home. I can use the machine whenever I need it, and my 5-year-old daughter, Christina, ...
Anne Gross, PhD, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN, has been named Senior Vice President for Patient Care Services and Chief Nursing Officer at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, effective December 1, 2016. Dr. Gross joined Dana-Farber in 2002 after 12 years at Cambridge Health Alliance as the nursing leader in...
Over the past few years, the term value-based cancer care has become integrated into the vernacular of the oncology community. Value is a subjective term, which is defined largely by its clinical setting. However, value in cancer care is evaluated by the multiple stakeholders involved in the...
A relatively recent study by Areej El-Jawahri, MD, and her colleagues is showing how the use of visual media can empower patients with advanced cancer, as well as other life-threatening illnesses, to make more informed decisions about their end-of-life care.1 The aim of Dr. El-Jawahri’s study was ...
According to Surveillance, Epidemiology, and end Results (SEER) data from 2008 to 2012, American males have an excess risk of 20.4% of developing any cancer compared with females, and there is a ≥ 2:1 male predominance for some individual cancers. This excess risk results in approximately...
Most women with hormone receptor–positive breast cancer receive endocrine therapy as part of their treatment, but “the reality is that patients who receive antihormone therapy in the metastatic disease setting ultimately develop disease progression, ” William J. Gradishar, MD, stated at the 18th...
Although there are no androgen receptor antagonists currently approved for the treatment of breast cancer, clinical trials indicate that these agents benefit some patients with triple-negative breast cancer, Tiffany A. Traina, MD, told participants at the 18th Annual Lynn Sage Breast Cancer...
Cutaneous T-cell lymphomas are a heterogeneous group of cancers. Some subtypes of cutaneous T-cell lymphomas are often misdiagnosed as benign skin diseases, making it challenging to gather reliable epidemiologic data. At the 3rd World Congress of Cutaneous Lymphomas (sponsored by the International...
Perry Robins, MD, Founder and President of the Skin Cancer Foundation, was honored at the organization’s Champions for Change Gala, held October 18 at the Mandarin Oriental New York. Dr. Robins was honored at the event as a “Champion for Change” for his lifetime commitment to decreasing the...
New research shows that excess weight increases the risk that a benign blood disorder will progress to multiple myeloma. The study, by a team at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, is published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Being overweight or obese has been...
Glioblastoma multiforme remains the most common and highly lethal brain cancer, known for its tendency to recur. Researchers at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center have identified a pathway by which cancer cells aggressively spread and grow in the brain, opening up new possibilities...
Immunotherapy with an anti–programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1) inhibitor—pembrolizumab (Keytruda)—showed encouraging responses in patients with advanced cutaneous T-cell lymphoma (either mycosis fungoides or Sézary syndrome). Pembrolizumab achieved a 38% overall response rate and responses...
In 2016 and 2017, a team from The Ralph Lauren Center for Cancer Care (RLCCC) is participating in an ASCO Quality Improvement Grant program, which is supported by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation. The grant program aims to improve the delivery of cancer care in medically underserved communities by...
Dear Friends: Each year, the Conquer Cancer Foundation of ASCO (CCF) Grants and Awards Ceremony is one of the highlights of the ASCO Annual Meeting. While most of the week in Chicago is packed with meetings, events, and presentations, the Grants and Awards Ceremony is a time for everyone to stop,...
Western Connecticut Health Network (WCHN) has named physician-scientist John A. Martignetti, MD, PhD, Network Director of the Laboratory for Translational Research at the WCHN Biomedical Research Institute. Dr. Martignetti is Associate Professor of Genetics and Genomic Sciences, Oncological...
Commenting on this talk during the discussion afterward, Youn Kim, MD, of Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California, said: “At our center, we use high-throughput sequencing of T-cell receptors daily in patients with cutaneous T-cell lymphomas, and it is a billable service paid...
High-throughput sequencing of T-cell receptors may be a solution to some of the challenges confronting oncologists who treat cutaneous T-cell lymphomas. According to experts who presented talks on high-throughput sequencing of T-cell receptors at the 3rd World Congress of Cutaneous Lymphoma...
Johns Hopkins Medicine specialists reported they have developed a urine test for the likely emergence of cervical cancer that is highly accurate compared to other tests based on genetic markers derived directly from cervical tissue. The new urine test, they said, is different because it analyzes...
In an article in The New England Journal of Medicine, Johnson et al reported the occurrence of fulminant, fatal immune-related myocarditis in two patients who received combined ipilimumab (Yervoy) and nivolumab (Opdivo) for metastatic melanoma. Patient Courses One patient was a 65-year-old woman...
Earlier this month, ASCO announced it has collaborated with Innovative Oncology Business Solutions, Inc (IOBS) to launch ASCO COME HOME, a patient-centered oncology medical home, to help transition community oncology practices from volume-based care to value-based care and to prepare oncologists to ...
Earlier this year, Sean Parker, the cofounder of the music streaming service Napster and an early president of Facebook, joined a growing list of entrepreneurs who are committing large portions of their wealth to funding cancer research. In April, Mr. Parker announced he was donating $250 million...
The Commack, Long Island–based hospital of Memorial Sloan Kettering (MSK) Cancer Center was opened in 2002, providing personalized cancer care closer to home for individuals living on eastern Long Island. Now, more than 14 years later, MSK is reinforcing its commitment to the local community in...
“The debate about perioperative chemotherapy in localized high-grade soft-tissue sarcoma is never-ending. Can this study resolve the debate?” asked formal discussant Axel Le Cesne, MD, of the Institute de Cancerologie Gustave-Roussy, Villejuif, France. “Surgery remains the standard of care for all ...
A landmark study showed that the investigational PARP (poly ADP-ribose polymerase) 1/2 inhibitor niraparib, when used as maintenance therapy, significantly improves the outcome of platinum-sensitive recurrent ovarian cancer. Specifically, niraparib significantly prolonged progression-free survival ...
Allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation is the only potentially curative treatment for myelofibrosis. The ASCO Post asked an expert in this field, Ayalew Tefferi, MD, how and when he uses stem cell transplant in myelofibrosis, which is a topic he outlined in greater detail in the...
November is National Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month, the impetus for this article. Pancreatic cancer is a huge health challenge. It's the eighth most common cancer in the United States and the fourth most common cause of cancer deaths but is expected to become the second most common cause of...
Cancer researcher Dafna Bar-Sagi, PhD, has made fundamental contributions to the understanding of the mechanisms that drive the disease. In recognition of her accomplishments, she has been named a recipient of the Outstanding Investigator Award, an honor presented by the National Cancer Institute...
In a case report in Cancer Biology & Therapy, Lou et al described an exceptional response to first-line treatment with the hedgehog inhibitor vismodegib (Erivedge) in a 51-year-old patient with a history of basal cell carcinoma who was diagnosed with an unresectable/multifocal form of adult...
While it is well established that obesity is closely linked to endometrial cancer risk, most past findings have only looked at risk in relation to one measure of body size at a time. In a new study led by the Cancer Prevention Institute of California, published by Horn-Ross et al in Cancer Causes...
Faltas et al identified factors in the clonal evolution of chemotherapy-resistant urothelial carcinoma, according to a study reported in Nature Genetics. Findings included wide intrapatient mutational heterogeneity and enrichment for clonal mutations involving L1 cell–adhesion molecule...
A randomized phase II clinical trial evaluating cabozantinib (Cabometyx) compared with standard-of-care sunitinib (Sutent) as first-line therapy for patients with advanced kidney cancer has found the experimental drug reduced the rate of disease progression or death by 34% compared with sunitinib....
After nearly 2 decades of unsuccessful attempts, researchers from the University of Chicago Medicine and the Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center have created the first mouse model for the most common form of infant leukemia. Their discovery, reported by Lin et al in Cancer Cell, could...
Blocking a molecule may bypass bowel cancer's defense against the drug cetuximab, according to new research presented by Weir et al at the National Cancer Research Institute (NCRI) Cancer Conference in Liverpool, United Kingdom. Cetuximab is used to treat advanced bowel cancer, and just under half ...
As part of its mission to improve the quality, effectiveness, and efficiency of cancer care so that patients can live better lives, the National Comprehensive Cancer Network® (NCCN®) has announced the launch of Just Bag It: The NCCN Campaign for Safe Vincristine...
José R. Conejo-Garcia, MD, PhD, has joined Moffitt Cancer Center as Coleader of the Immunology Program and Chair of the Department of Immunology. The Immunology Program is focused on defining the regulation role of immune checkpoint molecules in tumor immune surveillance and in identifying new...
Pang et al found that the enrollment disparity in clinical trials in lung cancer has been reduced in recent years for older patients and women overall, according to a study reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. However, disparities persist for elderly women, blacks, Asian/Pacific Islanders, ...
In the HIV-negative population, there is growing evidence suggesting that chronic hepatitis B virus (HBV) and hepatitis C virus (HCV) are both associated with the development of non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL), although the mechanisms underlying this association remain unclear. The incidence rate of NHL ...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology, Puya Gharahkhani, PhD, of QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, Brisbane, Australia, and colleagues identified several new genetic risk variants for the development of Barrett’s esophagus and esophageal adenocarcinoma through a large-scale meta-analysis of...