Tree nut consumption, as well as a generally healthy lifestyle, significantly reduced the risk of cancer recurrence and death in patients with stage III colon cancer treated in the Cancer and Leukemia Group B (CALGB) 89803 trial, researchers reported at the 2017 ASCO Annual Meeting. Two subanalyses ...
Combining the kinase inhibitor ibrutinib (Imbruvica) with an investigational personalized cellular therapy known as CTL119 can lead to complete remission in patients with high-risk chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), according to new research from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University...
As new treatment decision-making tools make their way toward and into the clinic, oncologists are getting a sense of how they may affect clinical practice—and beginning to look farther down the road. “What do you see ahead for clinicians?” asked Christian Downs, JD, Executive Director of the...
“The results of this trial are promising but need to be reproduced in the United States and other countries before clear recommendations can be made. There are adjuvant studies such as ALCHEMIST underway to test this strategy in U.S. patients,” said Trever Bivona, MD, PhD, Associate Professor of...
Adjuvant therapy with gefitinib (Iressa), an epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)-targeted agent, was more successful at preventing recurrence than standard-of-care chemotherapy, in a phase III study of patients with EGFR-positive non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).1 Gefitinib extended...
Among patients with cancer, as many as 53% of emergency department visits that do not require admission could be avoided with better symptom management and greater availability of outpatient care tailored to their needs, according to a new study from Fred Hutchinson Cancer...
Younger patients with colon cancer appear to have more than three times as many mutations in their tumors as older patients, which could lead to more effective treatment decisions, according to researchers at Georgetown Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center. In a new study, they found that tumor...
ASCO’s Targeted Agent and Profiling Utilization Registry (TAPUR) Study continues to expand and now has more than 300 participants enrolled on study drug, more than 100 sites, new partnerships, and a revised protocol to lower the age of eligibility. “We are very pleased with the...
Tanya B. Dorff, MD, of the USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center, and Sumanta K. Pal, MD, of the City of Hope, discuss two key presentations on prostate cancer: findings on adding abiraterone for men with high-risk prostate cancer starting long-term androgen-deprivation therapy, and an...
Findings from a phase III clinical trial point to a potential new treatment for patients newly diagnosed with advanced, epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)-positive non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Compared to the EGFR inhibitor gefitinib (Iressa), one of the standard targeted...
Malignant pleural mesothelioma is a rare cancer, but its incidence has been rising. This cancer is usually associated with asbestos exposure, and patients have a median life expectancy of only 13 to 15 months. All patients relapse despite initial chemotherapy, more than 50% of them within 6 months...
Dean F. Bajorin, MD, of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, and Peter H. O’Donnell, MD, of The University of Chicago Medical Center, discuss their study findings on treating advanced urothelial cancer with pembrolizumab, paclitaxel, docetaxel, or vinflunine. (Abstracts 4501 and 4502)
In an early clinical trial, 33 out of 35 (94%) patients had clinical remission of multiple myeloma upon receiving immunotherapy with chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells targeting B-cell maturation protein, or BCMA. Most patients had only mild side effects. The study was presented by Fan et al...
As reported in the Plenary Session at the 2017 ASCO Annual Meeting and in The New England Journal of Medicine by Robson et al, the phase III OlympiAD trial showed that the poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor olaparib (Lynparza) prolonged progression-free survival vs standard therapy in...
A phase III clinical trial of 4,805 women with HER2-positive breast cancer suggests the addition of a second HER2-targeted medicine, pertuzumab (Perjeta), to standard-of-care trastuzumab (Herceptin) after surgery may improve outcomes, although the benefit is modest. The study was presented by von...
As reported in the Plenary Session at the 2017 ASCO Annual Meeting and in The New England Journal of Medicine by Fizazi et al, the phase III LATITUDE trial has shown that the addition of abiraterone acetate (Zytiga) and prednisone to androgen-deprivation therapy resulted in marked improvements in...
Julie Vose, MD, MBA, of the University of Nebraska Medical Center, discusses two hematologic abstracts: results from the OPTIMAL>60 study on radiotherapy to bulky disease PET-negative after immunochemotherapy in elderly patients with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma; and an analysis of autologous...
Findings from a phase III clinical trial of about 300 women may introduce poly ADP ribose polymerase (PARP) inhibitors as a new type of treatment for breast cancer. Compared to standard chemotherapy, the oral targeted medicine olaparib (Lynparza) reduced the chance of progression of advanced,...
Adding abiraterone acetate (Zytiga) plus prednisone to standard hormonal therapy for men newly diagnosed with high-risk, metastatic prostate cancer lowers the chance of death by 38%. In a phase III clinical trial of 1,200 men, abiraterone also more than doubled the median time until the cancer...
The STAMPEDE clinical trial of nearly 2,000 men shows that adding abiraterone acetate (Zytiga) to a standard initial treatment regimen for high-risk, advanced prostate cancer lowers the relative risk of death by 37%. The 3-year survival rate was 76% with standard therapy alone vs 83% with standard...
Most patients experience significant distress after they are diagnosed with cancer. This distress not only erodes quality of life, but can also negatively affect the course of the disease and the patient’s ability to tolerate treatment. Yet few patients with cancer receive psychological...
Spinal cord compression is a common complication in people with metastatic cancer and is a major detriment to quality of life. Radiation treatment is widely used to relieve pain and other symptoms, but there is no standard recommended schedule, and approaches currently vary. Findings from a phase...
Advanced cancer triggers enormous distress and brings challenges that can seem overwhelming. Yet most cancer centers lack systematic approaches to help patients and families manage the practical and emotional toll of advanced cancer. Findings from a randomized clinical trial of 305 patients with...
In a study of three radiation therapies for early-stage breast cancer, one treatment option stands out as offering the most value based on factors including health outcomes, cost-effectiveness, and quality of life. The treatment—hypofractionated whole-breast irradiation—also requires...
Pembrolizumab (Keytruda) showed activity in previously treated patients with advanced programmed cell death ligand 1 (PD-L1)–positive endometrial cancer in a cohort of the phase Ib KEYNOTE-028 study. These findings were reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Ott et al. Study Details ...
Eric Paul Winer, MD, was born in Boston in 1956, a year when gasoline was 22 cents a gallon and IBM released the world’s first computer with a hard drive. His grandfather on his mother’s side had hemophilia and died 5 years before Dr. Winer was born. Although there was a 50% chance that Dr. Winer...
Bert Vogelstein, MD, was born on June 2, 1949, at The Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, the same renowned institution where he would later make his mark in the field of cancer genetics. As a young teen, he was an enthusiast and independent consumer of books, one of which helped shape...
Eliezer Robinson, MD, was born in Vienna, Austria, on June 17, 1931. At that time, Vienna, a bustling and prosperous city, was an important center of Jewish culture and education. Jews made up a large portion of the city’s professional class of doctors, lawyers, bankers, and artists. Dr. Robinson...
Susan G. Komen announced new advisory roles for eight leaders in breast cancer who will guide the organization’s education and advocacy work, public health efforts, and help direct Komen’s $920 million research program. On April 1, Jennifer A. Pietenpol, PhD, of Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center,...
Lori J. Pierce, MD, FASCO, FASTRO, grew up in Washington, DC, and moved with her family to Philadelphia while in high school. She still considers the fast-paced DC–Philadelphia corridor her home, but her passion for a career in medicine, in part, took seed in a small town located in North...
Hyman Muss, MD, a pioneer in geriatric oncology, considers himself “a real Brooklyn boy.” His father was a dentist, and his uncle was a general practitioner. “They both practiced out of a small brownstone house in Brownsville-Crown Heights. It was sort of reminiscent of the famous movie The Last...
Pembrolizumab (Keytruda), an anti–programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1) therapy, received regular approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for patients with locally advanced or metastatic urothelial carcinoma who have disease progression during or following platinum-containing...
Waun Ki Hong, MD, FACP, one of the nation’s leading experts in head and neck and lung cancers, was born in South Korea and grew up in a tiny village outside the nation’s capital of Seoul. Number six of seven siblings, Dr. Hong described his early life in the cozy village as blissful, until the...
The final overall survival results of the phase III TH3RESA trial indicate a 32% reduction in risk of death with ado-trastuzumab emtansine (Kadcyla) vs treatment of physician’s choice in patients with previously treated HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer. The findings were reported in The ...
George P. Canellos, MD, President of ASCO from 1993 to 1994, was born in Boston on November 1, 1934. “I came from a business family and never wanted to do business at all. As long back as I can remember, I always found medicine attractive—not only because you could help people, but you could also...
The nationally recognized hematologist-oncologist Mojtaba Akhtari, MD, was born and reared in Tehran, Iran. “In my early years, I had a couple of cousins who were medical students. When I visited them in their homes, I was fascinated with the images in their medical text books. I would flip the...
Bruce E. Johnson, MD, FASCO, 2017–2018 ASCO President, was born in St. Peter, Minnesota, and grew up on a rural dairy farm. “Neither of my parents had college degrees, but working on a dairy farm with them gave me a solid work ethic. I was working outside on the farm before I was 10 years old. In...
In 2009, I was living my dream. My work as a business development manager for a technology company was thriving; I had a satisfying social life; I was active in sports, especially hiking and biking; and I was involved in social justice causes as a volunteer at San Quentin State Prison, helping...
Bisphosphonates were first synthesized more than a century ago, with their initial usage restricted to a range of industrial processes until their potential clinical relevance was appreciated in the late 1960s.1 Then, following development for the treatment of osteoporosis and Paget’s disease of...
In the phase III OPTIMIZE-2 trial reported in JAMA Oncology, Gabriel N. Hortobagyi, MD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, and colleagues found that an every-12-week schedule of zoledronic acid was noninferior to an every-4-week schedule with regard to skeletal-related event...
On March 30, 2017, osimertinib (Tagrisso) was granted regular approval for the treatment of patients with metastatic epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) T790M–mutant non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), as detected by a U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved test, who have progressed...
The Pershing Square Sohn Cancer Research Alliance announced the six winners of the 4th annual Pershing Square Sohn Prize for Young Investigators in Cancer Research, awarded annually to promising early-career, New York City–area scientists. Recipients receive $200,000 in funding per year for up...
On March 27, 2017, the oral poly ADP-ribose polymerase (PARP) inhibitor niraparib (Zejula) was approved for maintenance treatment of patients with recurrent epithelial ovarian, fallopian tube, or primary peritoneal cancer who are in complete or partial response to platinum-based chemotherapy.1,2...
As the subtleties of metastatic prostate cancer become increasingly recognized, treatment should evolve accordingly, said Jessica M. Clement, MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of Connecticut Health System and Neag Cancer Center, Farmington. Of particular interest to Dr. Clement ...
Here are several abstracts selected from the proceedings of the 2016 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition, highlighting newer therapeutics in smoldering and relapsed and/or refractory multiple myeloma. For the full details of these study abstracts, visit...
Adding hydroxychloroquine, an inhibitor of autophagy, to neoadjuvant chemotherapy for pancreatic cancer increases its efficacy and alters the tumor’s molecular profile in a way that may render the tumor more susceptible to immune checkpoint inhibitors, according to interim data from a phase II...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has accepted for review a supplemental Biologics License Application (sBLA) for pembrolizumab (Keytruda) seeking approval for treatment of patients with recurrent or advanced gastric or gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) adenocarcinoma who have already...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Diéras et al, the final overall survival results of the phase III EMILIA trial show improved outcome with ado-trastuzumab emtansine (Kadcyla) vs capecitabine plus lapatinib (Tykerb) in previously treated HER2-positive advanced breast cancer. Approval of...
Johns Hopkins University faculty members Stephen B. Baylin, MD, and Robert F. Siliciano, MD, PhD, have been elected to the National Academy of Sciences in recognition of their “distinguished and continuing achievements in original research.” They are among 84 new members and 21 foreign associates ...
Attention is focused among the cancer community on identifying the optimal immunotherapy combinations, with more than 800 ongoing trials of combination therapy. Two studies presented at the 2017 Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) reported promising preliminary...