On February 22, lenalidomide (Revlimid) was approved as maintenance therapy for patients with multiple myeloma following autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplantation.1,2 The drug was previously approved to treat multiple myeloma (in combination with dexamethasone), anemia caused by...
The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS) together with the National Black Church Initiative (NBCI) announced the launch of a church-based initiative addressing striking health-care disparities among African Americans with multiple myeloma. Black Americans have twice the incidence of multiple...
Minimal residual disease is a promising biomarker for guiding the management of multiple myeloma that is becoming increasingly important with the advent of more efficacious therapies, according to emerging data and expert opinion. “The story of minimal residual disease in multiple myeloma is like...
From immunomodulatory agents and proteasome inhibitors to steroids, alkylators, and antibodies, recent years have witnessed an explosion of drug approvals for multiple myeloma. The challenge now, said Amrita Krishnan, MD, FACP, is figuring out how to incorporate them all, particularly in the...
In a population-based cohort study reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Su-Hsin Chang, PhD, of the Washington University School of Medicine, and colleagues found that overweight and obesity were associated with an increased risk of transformation of monoclonal gammopathy of...
The advent of successful monoclonal antibody therapy in the treatment of relapsed/refractory myeloma has dramatically improved the prognosis of patients for whom currently approved novel therapies have failed. In 2015, the approval of the combination of elotuzumab (Empliciti) with lenalidomide...
As reported in The New England Journal of Medicine by Meletios A. Dimopoulos, MD, of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, and colleagues, the phase III POLLUX trial has shown that the addition of the CD38-targeted antibody daratumumab (Darzalex) to lenalidomide...
Amrita Krishnan, MD, Director of the Judy and Bernard Briskin Center for Multiple Myeloma Research at the City of Hope in Duarte, California, told The ASCO Post that the most exciting drug in the “New Agents” session she moderated at the 2016 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting...
Early-phase studies suggest that venetoclax (Venclexta) holds promise as a treatment for myeloma. At the 2016 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition, investigators reported strong activity in heavily pretreated patients, especially those with the t(11;14)...
A French phase III trial (IFM 2009), reported by Attal et al in The New England Journal of Medicine, has shown that consolidation treatment with lenalidomide (Revlimid), bortezomib (Velcade), and dexamethasone (RVD) was associated with poorer progression-free survival vs high-dose chemotherapy and...
Adoptive T-cell therapy using “non-engineered” T cells has been showing activity in hematologic malignancies, according to a presentation by Ann M. Leen, PhD, at the 2017 ASCO-SITC Clinical Immuno-Oncology Symposium.1 Dr. Leen is an immunologist and works at the Center for Cell and Gene Therapy,...
Radiation therapy, either alone or in combination with chemotherapy or surgery, is one of the most common treatment options for people with cancer. Nearly two-thirds of patients with cancer in the United States receive radiation therapy during their illness. To support clinical decision-making...
A retrospective study has shown that the presence and abundance of a particular bacterial group in the intestinal microbiota are associated with a significantly lower risk of relapse or disease progression after allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation. The findings were reported by Peled et...
The treatment of multiple myeloma is becoming increasingly complicated. This is not only because of the complexity of the disease, but also because of the increasing number of effective combination treatments and continuous development of new drugs. This has resulted in an ever-increasing number ...
In the phase III SWOG S0777 trial reported in The Lancet, Brian G.M. Durie, MD, of Cedars-Sinai Samuel Oschin Cancer Center, and colleagues found that adding bortezomib (Velcade) to lenalidomide (Revlimid)/dexamethasone improved progression-free and overall survival in patients with newly...
“This is a big deal. This is going to change all of oncology, not just head and neck cancer,”1 Tanguy Seiwert, MD, remarked following a summary by Jeffrey Sosman, MD, on advances in immunotherapy for treating cancer.2 Dr. Sosman, Director of the Melanoma Program and Clinical Director of Cancer...
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. Clinical Trial Findings The...
In a lecture at the 2016 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition, Edward A. Stadtmauer, MD, Chief of the Hematologic Malignancies Section at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, Philadelphia, summarized the advances in chimeric antigen receptor...
For patients with multiple myeloma, chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy is gaining ground in pilot studies. At the 2016 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition, researchers presented their latest findings for this innovative therapy, which has proven...
People with rare cancers now have the option of joining a national clinical trial testing leading-edge immunotherapies for a wide variety of tumor types. It’s the first federally funded immunotherapy trial devoted to rare cancers. Despite their name, rare cancers make up more than 20% of cancers...
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...
The problem of pain management facing clinicians today is twofold: how to ensure safe and effective treatment for patients with cancer in chronic pain, while avoiding the overuse of opioid medications and the potential for substance use disorder and diversion. According to the American Cancer...
In a population-based cohort study reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Chang et al found that overweight and obesity were associated with an increased risk of transformation of monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance to multiple myeloma. Black race was also...
Like many other patients diagnosed with multiple myeloma, I didn’t know I had the cancer until I broke a bone. I had felt a twinge of pain on my left side when I hoisted a bucket of baseballs over my left shoulder after participating in a baseball tournament in the spring of 2011, but there was...
People with rare cancers now have the option of joining a national clinical trial testing leading-edge immunotherapies for a wide variety of tumor types. It’s the first federally funded immunotherapy trial devoted to rare cancers. Despite their name, rare cancers make up more than 20% of...
Kenneth C. Anderson, MD, an expert in multiple myeloma, will serve as President of the American Society of Hematology (ASH) for a year-long term through December 2017. Dr. Anderson is Director of the Lebow Institute for Myeloma Therapeutics and the Jerome Lipper Myeloma Center at Dana-Farber...
An antiretroviral drug that is used for human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) demonstrated strong activity when combined with bortezomib (Velcade) in patients with relapsed/refractory multiple myeloma in a small multicenter phase II study presented at the 2016 American Society of Hematology (ASH)...
The ASCO Post asked Philip McCarthy, MD, Professor of Oncology and Internal Medicine at Roswell Park Cancer, Buffalo, and Director of the Blood and Marrow Transplant Center there, to comment on these study findings. He first addressed the need to study earlier intervention for smoldering ...
High-risk patients with smoldering multiple myeloma responded to a regimen of elotuzumab (Empliciti), lenalidomide (Revlimid), and dexamethasone, in a multicenter phase II study led by Irene Ghobrial, MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston.1 “The high response rates among this patient...
In 2016, the Office of Hematology and Oncology Products of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a number of new molecular entities, indications, and tests. The most notable were drug approvals in disease areas such as non–small cell lung cancer, myeloma, head and neck cancer, and...
Lenalidomide (Revlimid), a cornerstone of therapy for multiple myeloma in the modern era, is making headway as maintenance therapy in chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL). Separate phase III studies presented at the 2016 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition showed...
A new study published in JAMA reported that patients with bone metastases due to breast cancer, prostate cancer, or multiple myeloma who used zoledronic acid every 12 weeks compared with every 4 weeks did not have in an increased risk of skeletal events over 2 years. In this study, Andrew L....
In the phase III SWOG S0777 trial reported in The Lancet, Durie et al found that adding bortezomib (Velcade) to lenalidomide (Revlimid)/dexamethasone improved progression-free and overall survival in patients with newly diagnosed myeloma who were not planned for immediate autologous stem cell...
Sergio A. Giralt, MD, Chief of the Adult Bone Marrow Transplant Service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York, and the Melvin Berlin Family Chair in Multiple Myeloma, commented on the findings of the StaMINA trial for The ASCO Post. He said the results of the largest randomized U.S....
Additional interventions following upfront autologous stem cell transplant in multiple myeloma did not further improve progression-free or overall survival over transplant alone in a multicenter study presented as a late-breaking abstract at the 2016 American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual...
The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society (LLS) has announced it has committed $40.3 million in new research investments to advance the most promising blood cancer science at leading academic and medical centers around the world, including Dana-Farber Cancer Institute; Weill Cornell Medicine; Memorial...
More than 100 participants are now enrolled on study drug in ASCO’s Targeted Agent and Profiling Utilization Registry (TAPUR) Study. The trial launched in March 2016 at 37 sites, and in November, it welcomed its newest participating clinical sites: Cancer Treatment Centers of America®,...
The National Comprehensive Cancer Network® (NCCN®), a Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS)-approved provider-led entity for imaging appropriate use criteria, continues to build its library of these standards and has published NCCN Imaging Appropriate Use Criteria™ for an additional 15 ...
The University of Nebraska Board of Regents voted to rename an area of the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC) in honor of a longtime professor who has made extraordinary contributions to the institution. The Center for Leukemia and Lymphoma Research, established in 2003, was renamed by...
On November 21, 2016, daratumumab (Darzalex) was approved for use in combination with lenalidomide (Revlimid) and dexamethasone or with bortezomib (Velcade) and dexamethasone for the treatment of patients with multiple myeloma who have received at least one prior therapy.1,2 The drug was initially ...
African Americans are more than twice as likely as their white counterparts to be diagnosed with multiple myeloma, and twice as likely to die from this form of cancer. Research presented at the 9th American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Conference on the Science of Cancer Health...
On November 21, 2016, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved daratumumab (Darzalex) in combination with lenalidomide (Revlimid) and dexamethasone or bortezomib (Velcade) and dexamethasone for the treatment of patients with multiple myeloma who have received at least one prior...
Trial results presented by Stadtmauer during the 58th American Society of Hematology (ASH) Annual Meeting & Exposition in San Diego (Abstract LBA-1) suggest two therapies that are often added to standard therapy in patients with multiple myeloma do not improve rates of progression-free survival ...
The National Comprehensive Cancer Network® (NCCN®), a Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS)-approved provider-led entity for imaging appropriate use criteria, continues to build its library of these standards and has published NCCN Imaging Appropriate Use Criteria™ for an ...
On November 21, 2016, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved daratumumab (Darzalex) in combination with lenalidomide (Revlimid) and dexamethasone, or bortezomib (Velcade) and dexamethasone, for the treatment of patients with multiple myeloma who have received at least one prior...
The University of Nebraska Board of Regents voted to rename an area of the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC) in honor of a longtime professor who has made extraordinary contributions to the institution. The Center for Leukemia and Lymphoma Research, established in 2003, was renamed by...
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...
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...
Here is a brief look at the study findings and clinical implications of several recent and important clinical trials in neoplastic hematology. Attention is focused on myelodysplastic syndromes, multiple myeloma, and chronic lymphocytic leukemia. Myelodysplastic Syndromes Clinical Trial:...
More than 100 participants are now enrolled on study drug in ASCO’s Targeted Agent and Profiling Utilization Registry (TAPUR) Study. The trial launched in March 2016 at 37 sites, and in November, it welcomed its newest participating clinical sites: Cancer Treatment Centers of America,...