Penelope Bradbury, MBChB, on Pleural Mesothelioma: New Results From the IND227 Trial of Cisplatin and Pemetrexed With or Without Pembrolizumab
2023 ASCO Annual Meeting
Penelope Bradbury, MBChB, of Canada’s Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, discusses phase III findings showing that, in patients with treatment-naive unresectable pleural mesothelioma, cisplatin and pemetrexed with pembrolizumab improved median overall survival with acceptable tolerability (Abstract LBA8505).
The ASCO Post Staff
Jennifer A. Ligibel, MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, discusses a telephone-based weight loss intervention that induced clinically meaningful weight loss in patients with breast cancer who had overweight and obesity, across demographic and tumor factors. Additional tailoring of the intervention may possibly enhance weight loss in Black and younger patients as well (Abstract 12001).
The ASCO Post Staff
Tycel J. Phillips, MD, and Alex F. Herrera, MD, both of the City of Hope National Medical Center, discuss results from the SWOG S1826 study, which showed that nivolumab and AVD (doxorubicin, vinblastine, and dacarbazine) improved progression-free survival vs brentuximab vedotin plus AVD in patients with advanced-stage classical Hodgkin lymphoma. Longer follow-up is needed to assess overall survival and patient-reported outcomes. This trial may be a key step toward harmonizing the pediatric and adult treatment of advanced-stage disease (LBA4).
The ASCO Post Staff
Jennifer L. Crombie, MD, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, discusses the historically poor outcomes for patients with relapsed or refractory diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL). Her study examined real-world data on the use of novel therapies in this population and found that outcomes with second- and third-line regimens of polatuzumab vedotin-piiq plus bendamustine and rituximab and tafasitamab plus lenalidomide remain suboptimal, with worse outcomes particularly after chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy (Abstract 7552).
The ASCO Post Staff
Amer Methqal Zeidan, MBBS, MHS, of Yale University and Yale Cancer Center, discusses phase III findings on the first-in-class telomerase inhibitor imetelstat, which was given to patients with heavily transfusion-dependent non-del(5q) lower-risk myelodysplastic syndromes that are resistant to erythropoiesis-stimulating agents. Imetelstat resulted in a significant and sustained red blood cell (RBC) transfusion independence in 40% of these heavily transfused patients. The response was also durable and accompanied by an impressive median hemoglobin rise of 3.6 g/dL, and seen in patients with and without ring sideroblasts. Importantly, reduced variant allele frequency was observed in the most commonly mutated myeloid genes which correlated with duration of transfusion independence and hemoglobin rise, therefore suggesting a disease-modifying potential of this agent (Abstract 7004).
The ASCO Post Staff
Lisa A. Carey, MD, of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Javier Cortes, MD, PhD, of the International Breast Cancer Center and Universidad Europea de Madrid, discuss phase II findings showing that one in three patients with HER2-positive early breast cancer may safely omit chemotherapy. Among the chemotherapy-free patients treated with trastuzumab and pertuzumab, the 3-year invasive disease–free survival was 98.8%, with no distant metastases (Abstract LBA506).
