In a study reported in JAMA Oncology, Michael S. Leapman, MD, and colleagues found that sociodemographic factors (like geographic area of residence) as well as manifestations of structural racism (like poverty and racial segregation) accounted for the majority of differences in the use of magnetic...
A new report from an ASCO expert panel that addresses unanswered questions about biosimilars—licensed biologic products that are largely analogous to products approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)—found that they may represent an affordable and effective alternative for cancer...
An update to a joint guideline from Cancer Care Ontario (now a division of Ontario Health) and ASCO provides revised recommendations for the use of adjuvant bone-modifying agents for patients with nonmetastatic breast cancer, with the overarching goal of improving relapse and survival rates.1,2...
In a commentary published recently in The Lancet Oncology,1 Harpreet Singh, MD, and Richard Pazdur, MD, both of the Oncology Center of Excellence at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), warned against the increasing number of oncology drug development programs based wholly or predominantly...
Priyanka Sharma, MD, of the University of Kansas Medical Center in Westwood, the invited discussant of the poster, noted that the DAISY study asked whether HER2-targeted antibody-drug conjugates—in this case, fam-trastuzumab deruxtecan-nxki (T-DXd)—have activity beyond the conventional...
The antibody-drug conjugate fam-trastuzumab deruxtecan-nxki (T-DXd) has led to practice changes in previously treated HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer. Most notably, in the DESTINY-Breast03 trial, treatment with T-DXd produced a doubling in 12-month progression-free survival vs...
The current standard of care for the neoadjuvant treatment of HER2-positive early-stage breast cancer consists of trastuzumab plus pertuzumab and polychemotherapy. But some patients, particularly those with locally advanced or inflammatory disease, still relapse and die. Furthermore, multiagent...
I returned home to the United Arab Emirates in 2017, following my oncology fellowship training and work experience in the United States. I immediately realized that I am now dealing with a considerably different cancer patient population in terms of age of onset, stage at presentation, awareness...
Patients with cancer are not only at an increased risk for developing severe COVID-19, but also face cancer treatment delays and interruptions due to the pandemic, potentially worsening cancer outcomes, according to the AACR Report on the Impact of COVID-19 on Cancer Research and Patient Care. In...
Christopher Willett, MD, Professor and Chair of the Department of Radiation Oncology at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, shared his thoughts on the findings of the study by Lumish et al1 with The ASCO Post. He first noted the shift in recent years toward total neoadjuvant therapy in the...
Guest Editor’s Note: Pain is a debilitating symptom experienced by many patients with cancer that negatively impacts their quality of life. Massage therapy, historically used for relaxation and pain relief, plays an important supportive role in oncology settings. In this installment of The ASCO...
MAGNITUDE is challenging from a statistical point of view,” said formal discussant Celestia S. Higano, MD, currently Adjunct Professor, Department of Urologic Sciences at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada, and formerly of Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle....
The phase II GERCOR NIPICOL study evaluated 1 year of treatment with nivolumab plus ipilimumab in patients with chemotherapy-resistant metastatic colorectal cancer whose tumors were microsatellite instability–high (MSI-H) or mismatch repair–deficient (dMMR). With this shortened treatment duration,...
Circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) is readily detectable in the plasma and cerebrospinal fluid of patients with central nervous system (CNS) lymphoma and is a strong prognostic biomarker for outcomes, a team of researchers from Germany and Stanford University reported at the 2021 American Society of...
Updates of phase II studies evaluating fam-trastuzumab deruxtecan-nxki (T-DXd) in gastrointestinal cancers were presented at the 2022 ASCO Gastrointestinal Cancers Symposium, continuing to offer support for the antibody-drug conjugate in these malignancies. In HER2-expressing gastric cancer, T-DXd...
Advanced radiotherapy techniques can reduce the risk of severe and debilitating toxicity associated with radiation, but not all patients have equal access to these modalities, according to data presented by Neal S. McCall, MD, at the 2022 Multidisciplinary Head and Neck Cancers Symposium (Abstract...
Axel S. Merseburger, MD, of the University Hospital Schleswig-Holstein, discusses results from a phase IIIb study of chemotherapy-naive patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer who have been treated with docetaxel plus prednisolone and experienced disease progression on...
Use of the first investigational oral selective estrogen receptor degrader (SERD) elacestrant significantly reduced the risk of death or disease progression and lengthened progression-free survival compared with standard-of-care endocrine therapy with fulvestrant or an aromatase inhibitor in...
The final results of the phase III PALLAS trial1 are “deeply disappointing,” said session moderator Matthew J. Ellis, MB, BChir, PhD, FACP, Professor of Medicine and Director of the Lester and Sue Smith Breast Center at Baylor College of Medicine. The results of the final primary analysis of...
The final protocol-defined analysis of the phase III PALLAS trial confirmed the negative results of the second interim analysis, showing no benefit of palbociclib plus endocrine therapy in the adjuvant breast cancer setting. Michael Gnant, MD, of the Medical University of Vienna, reported these...
Angela DeMichele, MD, MSCE, the Alan and Jill Miller Professor in Breast Cancer Excellence at the Perelman School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, commented on NIMBUS1 for The ASCO Post. She said obtaining information on tumor mutational burden is simple, as it is...
Patients with advanced HER2-negative metastatic breast cancer and high tumor mutational burden achieved responses—often durable—from treatment with the immunotherapy doublet of nivolumab and ipilimumab, according to the results of the phase II NIMBUS trial reported at the 2021 San Antonio Breast...
Invited discussant of the KEYNOTE-355 trial, Hope S. Rugo, MD, FASCO, one of the coauthors of the study, had presented the survival data at the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) Congress 2021.1 The San Antonio presentation was a more in-depth evaluation of survival by different PD-L1...
The discussant of KEYNOTE-522 at the 2021 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, Hope S. Rugo, MD, FASCO, Professor of Medicine and Director of Breast Oncology and Clinical Trials Education at the University of California San Francisco Comprehensive Cancer Center, commented: “We are clearly making...
The ASCO Post asked Debu Tripathy, MD, Professor and Chair of Medical Breast Oncology at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, and Hope S. Rugo, MD, FASCO, Professor of Medicine, Director of Breast Oncology and Clinical Trials Education at the University of California San...
The current standard of care for the neoadjuvant treatment of HER2-positive early-stage breast cancer consists of trastuzumab plus pertuzumab and polychemotherapy. But some patients, particularly those with locally advanced or inflammatory disease, still relapse and die. Furthermore, multiagent...
Priyanka Sharma, MD, of the University of Kansas Medical Center in Westwood, the invited discussant of the poster, noted that the DAISY study asked whether HER2-targeted antibody-drug conjugates—in this case, fam-trastuzumab deruxtecan-nxki (T-DXd)—have activity beyond the conventional...
The antibody-drug conjugate fam-trastuzumab deruxtecan-nxki (T-DXd) has led to practice changes in previously treated HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer. Most notably, in the DESTINY-Breast03 trial, treatment with T-DXd produced a doubling in 12-month progression-free survival vs...
The antibody-drug conjugate fam-trastuzumab deruxtecan-nxki (T-DXd) lengthened progression-free survival and improved the objective response rate compared with the antibody-drug conjugate ado-trastuzumab emtansine (T-DM1) after trastuzumab and taxane therapy in women with HER2-positive metastatic...
In its first return to a hybrid model since the COVID-19 pandemic began, the 2021 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium (SABCS) brought together researchers, clinicians, industry experts, patients, and advocates from across the globe to present and grapple with new data and important topics in breast ...
In the phase II SWOG 1318 trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Advani et al found that blinatumomab induction and consolidation followed by maintenance with POMP (prednisone, vincristine, mercaptopurine, and methotrexate) produced good outcomes in patients aged ≥ 65 years with newly...
Precursors to multiple myeloma were identified by population screening in two studies reported at the 2021 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition. The prevalence of monoclonal gammopathies was determined in the PROMISE trial using cutting-edge technology in a high-risk ...
In the primary analysis of the phase III ZUMA-7 trial, examining second-line therapy for relapsed or refractory large B-cell lymphoma, the CAR T-cell therapy axicabtagene ciloleucel led to a fourfold increase in event-free survival over the standard of care. These findings were presented at the...
The first 6 months of fellowship in a nutshell: Waves. July A move back to the waves of the Atlantic Calmly and incessantly recoiling while The Greek alphabet regains traction. August The fallout of Delta. Telemedicine for goals of care, While reciting the ABCs of chemotherapy. September Boards,...
The three most common reasons patients with cancer surveyed at an outpatient infusion therapy clinic gave for not having received at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine were: My doctor has not told me to get the vaccine. I do not think it is safe for me because I have cancer. I’m afraid of the side ...
“My doctor has not told me to get the vaccine.” That was the number one reason patients with cancer gave in a survey at an outpatient infusion therapy clinic for not having received at least one dose of the COVID-19 vaccine. Rivalling that reason were concerns about safety and fear of vaccine side...
Ajay K. Nooka, MD, MPH, FACP, Associate Professor in the Department of Hematology and Medical Oncology at Winship Cancer Institute, Emory University, Atlanta, commented on the promising emergence of bispecific T-cell engaging (bispecific) antibodies, as represented by studies presented at the 2021...
Poor outcomes are observed in patients with myeloma who are refractory to multiple classes of therapies, with the average patient experiencing disease progression in up to 6 months and living no longer than 6 to 15 months. Patients often rapidly cycle through regimens that use less effective or...
In December 2021, Nobel laureates, cancer center directors, physicians, scientists, politicians, public health officials, and patient advocates gathered at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in Yorba Linda, California, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the signing of the National...
A new clinical guideline from the American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO) provides guidance on the use of external-beam radiation therapy (EBRT) to treat adults with primary liver cancers. The guideline, ASTRO’s first for primary liver cancers, is published in Practical Radiation ...
In patients with newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukemia (AML) with an IDH1 mutation who were ineligible for intensive chemotherapy, the addition of the IDH1 inhibitor ivosidenib to azacitidine significantly improved survival vs azacitidine alone, according to data presented at the 2021 American...
The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and successful hybrid format dominated much of the discussion at the 2021 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition, but the lasting impact of the meeting will be the groundbreaking research that was presented. Throughout all diseases,...
In an NRG Oncology/GOG study (GOG-0259) reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Donovan et al found that both nurse-led (Nurse-WRITE) and self-directed (SD-WRITE) Web-based symptom self-management interventions (WRITE Symptoms) improved symptom control vs enhanced usual care alone in women...
This past fall, Memorial Sloan Kettering (MSK) Cancer Center in New York expanded its adolescent and young adult (AYA) program with the establishment of the Lisa and Scott Stuart Center for Adolescent and Young Adult Cancers. The Stuart Center is now part of the increasing list of about 50 academic ...
As reported in The New England Journal of Medicine by Krishnansu S. Tewari, MD, and colleagues, the phase III EMPOWER-Cervical1/GOG-3016/ENGOT-cx9 trial has shown improved overall survival with cemiplimab-rwlc vs investigator’s choice of single-agent chemotherapy in patients with cervical cancer...
In a commentary published in The Lancet Oncology, Harpreet Singh, MD, and Richard Pazdur, MD, both of the Oncology Center of Excellence at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), warned against the increasing number of oncology drug development programs based wholly or predominantly on data...
I was honored to contribute a chapter on the cancer care delivery system and how to improve it for the book A New Deal for Cancer: Lessons From a 50 Year War, edited by Abbe R. Gluck and Charles Fuchs, MD, MPH (Public Affairs, 2021). The book chronicles what has been accomplished in the 50 years...
The Russian Federation is the largest country in the world, extending from Eastern Europe to Northern Asia and the Pacific Ocean. The population of more than 140 million people is unevenly distributed across the country.1 As a result, Russia has high spatial inequality in terms of accessibility of...
Angela DeMichele, MD, MSCE, the Alan and Jill Miller Professor in Breast Cancer Excellence at the Perelman School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, commented on NIMBUS1 for The ASCO Post. She said obtaining information on tumor mutational burden is simple, as it is part ...
Patients with advanced HER2-negative metastatic breast cancer and high tumor mutational burden achieved responses—often durable—from treatment with the immunotherapy doublet of nivolumab and ipilimumab, according to results of the phase II NIMBUS trial reported at the 2021 San Antonio Breast Cancer ...