According to the National Cancer Institute, uterine sarcomas are rare gynecologic malignancies comprising between 2% and 5% of all uterine malignancies. Leiomyosarcomas, which arise from myometrial muscle, account for 30% of all uterine sarcomas. These aggressive, rare cancers are characterized by...
Earlier this year, ASCO submitted comments to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in response to a Request for Information on data-sharing and management (NOT-OD-17-015). In the comment letter, ASCO expressed support for the NIH’s efforts to develop a framework and strategies for data-sharing ...
Despite advances in treating chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), the 5% to 10% of patients who develop Richter transformation continue to have poor outcomes. For these patients, median progression-free survival is approximately 6 months, and median overall survival is about 8 months. Phase II...
On February 22, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) expanded the existing indication for lenalidomide (Revlimid) 10 mg capsules to include use for patients with multiple myeloma as maintenance therapy following autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplant. The expanded indication makes...
Innovation in precision medicine has introduced an amalgam of testing options, of which hereditary cancer panels—multigene tests—are a major component. Additionally, the importance of inherited cancer genomics was further bolstered by former President Barack Obama’s Precision...
Patients with advanced malignant soft-tissue sarcoma of the extremities have typically faced amputation of the afflicted limb as the only treatment option. However, a technique that limits the application of chemotherapy to the cancerous region can preserve limbs in a high percentage of these...
A revised tumor classification based on 70,967 evaluable patients with non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and 6,189 patients with small cell lung cancer is now available to lung cancer specialists around the world in the form of the 8th edition of the tumor, node, and metastasis (TNM)...
The two main classes of immune checkpoint inhibitors used to treat non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) have essentially the same efficacy and toxicity profiles, according to a systematic review and meta-analysis of 23 trials with a total of 5,899 patients.1 Results showed that about one-fifth of...
Increasing experience with immunotherapy for lung cancer in both the lab and the clinic is helping to refine treatment approaches and point the way forward, according to Naiyer Rizvi, MD, Director of both Thoracic Oncology and Immunotherapeutics at Columbia University Medical Center in New York....
Here are several abstracts selected from the proceedings of this year’s American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition, highlighting newer therapeutics in high-grade, aggressive B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphomas (NHLs), including newly diagnosed as well as relapsed or refractory...
Treating patients with head and neck cancer with hyperfractionated twice-daily radiation therapy combined with chemotherapy may potentially reduce mortality, according to new research presented by Claire Petit, PhD, and colleagues at the 2017 European Cancer Congress (ECCO).1 The study included...
“The progression-free and overall survival curves of CheckMate 057 suggest the presence of two patient populations with respect to nivolumab (Opdivo): a relatively sensitive one and a less sensitive, possibly even resistant, one, according to invited discussant Paul Mitchell, MD, Associate...
Prognostic factors and tumor expression of programmed cell death ligand 1 (PD-L1) predict early mortality among patients with previously treated nonsquamous advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who receive nivolumab instead of docetaxel. But these features are not reliable for excluding...
Vincent J. Picozzi, MD, a pancreatic cancer specialist at Virginia Mason Hospital in Seattle, commented on the findings by Chan et al presented at the 2017 Gastrointestinal Cancers Symposium. Dr. Picozzi first acknowledged that there is a strong biologic rationale for evaluating cabozantinib...
For hepatocellular carcinoma patients awaiting a liver transplant, locoregional treatment as a “bridge” is a standard strategy for reducing tumor progression. The most common approach is transarterial chemoembolization, but a study from a large-volume liver transplant center questions whether it...
The immune checkpoint inhibitor durvalumab (also known as MEDI4736) is active and achieves durable responses in patients with heavily pretreated advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) that does not have any epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) or anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK)...
A wide range of patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) see a survival advantage from second- or third-line atezolizumab (Tecentriq) as compared with docetaxel, according to new data from the OAK trial.1 The main results of the randomized phase III trial, previously reported,...
When used as first-line therapy for advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), pembrolizumab (Keytruda) yields better health-related quality of life than platinum-based chemotherapy, suggest new data from the randomized phase III KEYNOTE-024 trial.1 After 15 weeks of treatment, changes in scores...
“There are several possible ways to move first-line immunotherapy for non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) forward, according to invited discussant Edward B. Garon, MD, Director of Thoracic Oncology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles. “We could expand...
In 2016, the KEYNOTE-024 trial set the bar for first-line immunotherapy in non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Trial results showed that pembrolizumab (Keytruda), an antibody to programmed cell death protein 1 (PD-1), reduced the risk of disease progression or death by 50% and the risk of death by...
In 1959, my 5-year-old cousin, Kim, was diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL). As an 8-year-old, I didn’t really understand what was happening to him, except that he had to go to the Riley Hospital for Children in Indianapolis, Indiana, for treatment. The haunting vision of his looking...
“Immunotherapy for lung cancer is a paradigm shift. I would never have thought when I started my career taking care of lung cancer patients in the mid 1990s that we’d now be substituting chemotherapy with an antibody immunotherapy in 2017. It’s incredible,” commented Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, Chief...
Lung cancer is the second most commonly diagnosed cancer and the leading cause of cancer-related mortality in the United States, with an estimated 224,390 new cases and 158,080 deaths from the disease in 2016.1 Despite improving survival rates in recent decades, only about 18% of patients are...
Frank Sinicrope, MD, Professor of Medicine and Oncology at the Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, told The ASCO Post that anti–programmed cell death protein 1 (anti–PD-1) agents “have already changed the landscape” of metastatic colorectal cancer. “We are currently treating microsatellite...
With 6 additional months of follow-up since the initial presentation of results, in the phase II CheckMate 142 trial, 74% of heavily pretreated patients with metastatic colorectal microsatellite instability–high (MSI-H) cancers are alive after single-agent treatment with nivolumab (Opdivo).1...
After an infection with the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), the virus persists in the body throughout a person's lifetime, usually without causing any symptoms. About one-third of infected teenagers and young adults nevertheless develop infectious mononucleosis, which usually wears off after a few weeks. ...
Researchers at Mount Sinai Health System have discovered a way to predict whether patients with blood cancer who received a bone marrow transplant will develop graft-vs-host disease, according to a study published by Hartwell et al in JCI (The Journal of Clinical...
Two investigational agents, the aurora A kinase inhibitor alisertib and a virus derived from HSV-1 (HSV1716), have shown antitumor efficacy in early clinical trials as monotherapies. A new study published by Currier et al in Oncotarget, however, demonstrates that the combined usage...
In a phase II trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Dréno et al found that two long-term intermittent vismodegib (Erivedge) dosing regimens provided a similar reduction in the number of clinically significant basal cell carcinomas among patients with multiple lesions. Study Details In the ...
In a study reported in the Journal of Oncology Practice, Goodman et al described a management practice for low-risk neutropenic fever in cancer patients that has reduced in-patient stay with intravenous antibiotic use at Cleveland Clinic Taussig Cancer Institute. Study Details In the study,...
In a population-based study reported in a research letter in JAMA, Kurian et al found that genetic testing and genetic counseling are suboptimal among women with newly diagnosed breast cancer. Study Details The study involved 2,451 women aged 20 through 79 years diagnosed with stage 0 to II...
Analysis of free-floating cancer DNA from blood samples has yielded leads for new prostate cancer treatment targets. Using a commercially available “liquid biopsy” test in patients with advanced prostate cancer, researchers found a number of genetic changes in cell-free, circulating...
As reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Antonia Sepulveda, MD, PhD, of Columbia University, and colleagues, a joint guideline on the use of molecular biomarkers for evaluation of colorectal cancer has been developed by an expert panel from the American Society for Clinical Pathology...
In the phase III OPTIMIZE-2 trial reported in JAMA Oncology, Hortobagyi et al found that an every-12-week schedule of zoledronic acid was noninferior to an every-4-week schedule in terms of skeletal-related event rate in women with bone metastases from breast cancer who were currently receiving...
In the largest study of its kind to date, researchers from Fox Chase Cancer Center and the Lewis Katz School of Medicine at Temple University confirmed that oral antibiotics combined with mechanical bowel preparation were more effective at preventing surgical site infections...
As reported by Zelenetz et al in The Lancet Oncology, an interim analysis of a phase III trial has shown the superiority of adding the phosphoinositide-3-kinase δ inhibitor idelalisib (Zydelig) to bendamustine/rituximab (Rituxan) in patients with relapsed or refractory chronic lymphocytic...
Albert H. Owens, Jr, MD, a Johns Hopkins oncologist who played a leadership role in developing oncology as a scientific discipline and clinical specialty—and who also served as President of The Johns Hopkins Hospital—died January 13 at the age of 90. In the 1960s, oncology was not a word that...
The ability to artificially alter DNA opens the door to new scientific understanding and treatments for various diseases. Oliver Smithies, PhD, made the crucial discovery that a disease-causing gene could be modified. For that and other groundbreaking work, he, along with two other scientists, was ...
The multihumoral manifestations of neuroendocrine tumors include diarrhea, cutaneous flushing, wheezing, and right-sided valvular heart disease.1 Serotonin, a biogenic amine and product of tryptophan metabolism,2 mediates several of these symptoms.3,4 Diarrhea is a cardinal and often disabling...
Technologic advances for detecting and analyzing cell-free circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) from peripheral blood offer a precision method for monitoring diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL). Although most patients with DLBCL are cured with initial therapy, those who are not cured have a poor...
In a study reported in Science Translational Medicine, Florian Scherer, MD, David M. Kurtz, MD (Conquer Cancer Foundation Young Investigator), Aaron M. Newman, PhD, and colleagues from Stanford University found that analysis of circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) permits identification of patterns of...
Compared to chemotherapy, the use of first-line ceritinib (Zykadia) resulted in a statistically significant and clinically meaningful improvement in median progression-free survival, with an estimated 45% reduction in disease progression risk, as well as significant improvements in quality of...
Cervical cancer is a preventable disease if detected on time, but it remains one of the leading causes of cancer deaths among women in Latin America, particularly women of poor and indigenous communities. A new study by the University of Michigan published by Gottschlich et al in the Journal of...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Sharma et al, the phase II CheckMate 275 trial has shown nivolumab (Opdivo) to produce durable responses in patients with metastatic urothelial cancer who had received at least one prior platinum-based regimen. The study supported the recent accelerated...
On February 3, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) accepted for review two supplemental Biologics License Applications (sBLAs) for pembrolizumab (Keytruda) in patients with locally advanced or metastatic urothelial cancer. Specifically, the application for first-line use was accepted and...
As reported in The New England Journal of Medicine by Shipley et al in the NRG Oncology Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG), the final analysis of the phase III RTOG 9601 trial showed that the addition of antiandrogen therapy with bicalutamide to radiation therapy significantly improves overall ...
Durvalumab was active and led to long-lasting response in a cohort of heavily pretreated patients with epidermal growth factor receptor/anaplastic lymphoma kinase (EGFR/ALK) wild-type locally advanced and metastatic non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), particularly among patients whose tumors...
In October 2016, the Conquer Cancer Foundation of ASCO (CCF) hosted its Second Scientific and Career Development Retreat at ASCO headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia. Attendees included Career Development Award (CDA) and Young Investigator Award (YIA) recipients awarded between 2010 and 2016; ASCO ...
At the 2016 American Society for Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition, researchers reported early success with two new experimental agents for high-risk myelodysplastic syndromes—enasidenib (also known as AG-221), a potent oral inhibitor of the isocitrate dehydrogenase 2 (IDH2) enzyme,...
Here are several abstracts selected from the proceedings of this year’s American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition, highlighting newer therapeutics in several different types of non-Hodgkin lymphomas (NHLs), including mantle cell lymphoma and marginal zone lymphoma. For...