Matthew Manning, MD, on Resolving Racial Disparities in the Treatment of Breast and Lung Cancers
2021 ASTRO Annual Meeting
Matthew Manning, MD, of Cone Health Cancer Center, discusses findings that showed changes to the way cancer care is delivered may help eliminate racial disparities in survival among patients with early-stage lung and breast cancers. Identifying and addressing obstacles that kept patients from finishing radiation treatments for cancer were associated with improved 5-year survival rates for all patients (Abstract 53).
The ASCO Post Staff
Aadel A. Chaudhuri, MD, PhD, of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, discusses circulating tumor DNA, which has the potential to better personalize treatment for patients with oligometastatic cancer and help clinicians determine whether to offer systemic therapy alone or curative-intent local consolidative therapy.
The ASCO Post Staff
Amar U. Kishan, MD, of the University of California, Los Angeles, discusses findings from a meta-analysis of clinical trials in patients with localized prostate cancer. The phase III results suggest that the use of androgen-deprivation therapy (ADT) or prolonged adjuvant ADT with radiotherapy may benefit patients with localized prostate cancer. Further biomarkers are needed to better personalize treatment intensification (Abstract 8).
The ASCO Post Staff
Karen M. Winkfield, MD, PhD, of Vanderbilt University Medical Center, who co-chaired a session (PS 02) on digital health, summarizes the talks, which included ways to reduce disparities with digital innovations and the importance of patient input, especially in the form of patient-reported outcomes and experience measures. Advancing digital health, which the FDA defines as including health information technology, telemedicine, and personalized medicine, can potentially improve cancer care.
The ASCO Post Staff
Robert A. Olson, MD, of the University of British Columbia, discusses phase II findings from the SABR-5 trial on stereotactic ablative radiotherapy for up to five oligometastases. Although toxicity of liver and adrenal metastases warrants caution, the trial seemed to show that this type of radiation treatment is relatively safe and should be studied further, given the long overall survival in this patient population (Abstract 6).
The ASCO Post Staff
Howard M. Sandler, MD, of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, discusses whether hypofractionation can be safely employed in the post-prostatectomy setting and the role of short-term hormone therapy in the management of intermediate-risk prostate cancer with radiotherapy.
