Richard L. Schilsky, MD, Chief Medical Officer of ASCO, talks about some of the most important and practice-changing findings presented this year at the ASCO20 Virtual Scientific Program, including the use of targeted and immunotherapies in earlier lines of therapy, where they have made a significant impact.
Suresh S. Ramalingam, MD, of Emory University, discusses a 3-year update from the CheckMate 227, Part 1, trial, which showed that nivolumab plus ipilimumab continued to provide durable and long-term overall survival benefit vs platinum-doublet chemotherapy as first-line treatment for patients with advanced non–small cell lung cancer (Abstract 9500).
David C. Fajgenbaum, MD, MBA, of the University of Pennsylvania, who trained as an oncologist, summarizes his opening lecture, a dramatic story of his battle against Castleman, a disease of the lymph nodes, his multiple near-death experiences, and the path that led him to develop a cooperative research effort making a difference for him and other patients with this idiopathic orphan illness.
Howard A. Burris III, MD, FACP, FASCO, talks about some of the reports of research developments he is looking forward to and how future conferences could incorporate virtual presentations.
Douglas B. Johnson, MD, of Vanderbilt University Medical Center, discusses three important melanoma abstracts: the need for more than two doses of nivolumab plus ipilimumab in combination immunotherapy; antitumor activity for low-dose ipilimumab with pembrolizumab after disease progression on PD-1 antibodies; and ipilimumab alone or in combination with anti–PD-1 therapy for metastatic disease resistant to PD-1 monotherapy (Abstracts 10003, 10004, and 10005).
Jeffrey A. Meyerhardt, MD, MPH, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, discusses results from the CALGB/SWOG 80702 trial of celecoxib plus standard adjuvant therapy with fluorouracil, leucovorin, and oxaliplatin (FOLFOX). Adding celecoxib to standard chemotherapy did not significantly improve disease-free or overall survival (Abstract 4003).
