Lena E. Winestone, MD, MSHP, on Health-Care Disparities in Hematologic Cancers: Real-World Data
2020 ASH Annual Meeting & Exposition
Lena E. Winestone, MD, MSHP, of the University of California, San Francisco and Benioff Children’s Hospital, reviews different aspects of bias in treatment delivery, including patient selection for clinical trials; racial and ethnic disparities in survival for indolent non-Hodgkin diffuse large B-cell lymphomas; and end-of-life hospitalization of patients with multiple myeloma, as well as outcome disparities (Abstracts 207-212).
The ASCO Post Staff
Ann-Kathrin Eisfeld, MD, of The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center, discusses SEER data showing that patients with acute myeloid leukemia who are Black and younger than age 60 may have poor survival outcomes, a disparity that should be addressed and further studied to establish molecular risk profiles (Abstract 6).
Paul G. Richardson, MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, gives his expert perspective on three important studies in multiple myeloma: long-term results from the IFM 2009 trial on early vs late autologous stem cell transplant in patients with newly diagnosed disease; the effect of high-dose melphalan on mutational burden in relapsed disease; and daratumumab plus lenalidomide, bortezomib, and dexamethasone in transplant-eligible patients with newly diagnosed disease (Abstracts 143, 61, and 549).
The ASCO Post Staff
Tycel J. Phillips, MD, of the University of Michigan Rogel Cancer Center, discusses phase II data from the CITADEL-204 study, showing that patients with relapsed or refractory marginal zone lymphoma who were not previously treated with a Bruton’s tyrosine kinase inhibitor achieved rapid and durable responses with single-agent parsaclisib. Comparable results were also observed in patients with nodal, extranodal, or splenic disease (Abstract 338).
The ASCO Post Staff
Jorge E. Cortes, MD, of the Georgia Cancer Center at Augusta University, reviews four important studies of treatment advances in chronic myeloid leukemia (CML): nilotinib vs dasatinib in newly diagnosed disease; final 5-year results from the BFORE trial on bosutinib vs imatinib for chronic phase (CP) CML; data from the OPTIC trial on ponatinib for CP-CML; and a novel class of mutated cancer-related genes associated with the Philadelphia translocation (Abstracts 45, 46, 48, 49).
The ASCO Post Staff
Curtis Lachowiez, MD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses an interim analysis of a phase Ib/II study showing that venetoclax plus chemotherapy represents an effective regimen, particularly in patients with newly diagnosed and relapsed or refractory acute myeloid leukemia. The regimen appears to be an effective bridge to hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (Abstract 332).
