Nicholas J. Short, MD, on ALL: Ponatinib Plus Blinatumomab May Help Patients Avoid Transplants
2021 ASCO Annual Meeting
Nicholas J. Short, MD, of The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses early results from a phase II study which showed that combining ponatinib and blinatumomab in patients with Philadelphia chromosome–positive acute lymphoblastic leukemia may prove to be an effective chemotherapy-free regimen that might reduce the need for allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplant (Abstract 7001).
The ASCO Post Staff
Linda R. Mileshkin, MBBS, MD, of the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, discusses phase III findings from the OUTBACK trial, which showed that adjuvant chemotherapy given after standard cisplatin-based chemoradiation for women with locally advanced cervical cancer did not improve either overall or progression-free survival (Abstract LBA3).
The ASCO Post Staff
Peter C. Black, MD, of the Vancouver Prostate Centre, University of British Columbia, reviews three studies on early detection and treatment of Black patients with prostate cancer: a large-scale analysis of genomic profiling; the use of PSA screening; and integrating a patient-specific genomic classifier to improve risk classification and treatment recommendations for Black men (Abstracts 5003, 5004, and 5005).
The ASCO Post Staff
Thierry André, MD, of Hôpital Saint-Antoine, discusses final overall survival data for the phase III KEYNOTE-177 study, which confirmed pembrolizumab as a new standard of care for first-line treatment of patients with microsatellite instability–high/mismatch repair–deficient metastatic colorectal cancer (Abstract 3500).
The ASCO Post Staff
Andrew Tutt, PhD, MBChB, of the Institute of Cancer Research, London, discusses findings from the phase III OlympiA trial, which showed that adjuvant olaparib, a PARP inhibitor, following adjuvant or neoadjuvant chemotherapy, may improve invasive disease–free survival in patients with germline BRCA-mutated and high-risk HER2-negative early breast cancer, which might lead to a new indication in this setting (Abstract LBA1).
The ASCO Post Staff
Brian I. Rini, MD, of Vanderbilt University, discusses findings from KEYNOTE-426, the longest follow-up of a checkpoint inhibitor (pembrolizumab) combined with a VEGF/VEGFR inhibitor (axitinib) for first-line clear cell renal cell carcinoma. The trial results continue to support this combination as a standard of care for patients with previously untreated disease (Abstract 4500).
