Patricia Stewart

Chicago, IL—It is well documented that clinical trials thus far have for the most part excluded underserved populations, and that means the results of these trials cannot be generalized to society at large. Fortunately, the federal government and medical societies have taken aim at remedying this imbalance in accrual for clinical trials. Read More ›

Chicago, IL—The addition of the PD-1 inhibitor pembrolizumab (Keytruda) to chemotherapy with or without bevacizumab (Avastin) resulted in a substantial and clinically meaningful improvement in overall survival (OS) in patients with persistent, recurrent, or metastatic cervical cancer, according to the final OS analysis of the phase 3 KEYNOTE-826 trial. Read More ›

Chicago, IL—The presidential theme for the 2023 American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting was “Partnering With Patients: The Cornerstone of Clinical Care and Research.” In his address during the opening session of the meeting, Eric P. Winer, MD, FASCO, Director, Yale Cancer Center, and Physician-in-Chief, Smilow Cancer Hospital at Yale New Haven, CT, and ASCO’s 2022-2023 President, discussed the importance of physician–patient partnerships for improving healthcare outcomes. Read More ›

Chicago, IL—The addition of the CDK4/6 inhibitor ribociclib (Kisqali) to endocrine therapy significantly improved invasive disease-free survival in patients with hormone receptor (HR)-positive, HER2-negative, early breast cancer, according to interim results of the phase 3 NATALEE trial, which were presented at the 2023 American Society of Clinical Oncology Annual Meeting. Read More ›

Chicago, IL—Interim results from the phase 3 COMMANDS trial demonstrated that first-line treatment with luspatercept-aamt (Reblozyl) increased hemoglobin levels and enabled nearly twice as many patients with transfusion-dependent, lower-risk myelodysplastic syndromes to avoid red blood cell transfusions during the first 24 weeks of the study compared with standard-of-care epoetin alfa. Read More ›

During the 2023 American Association for Cancer Research Annual Meeting, researchers presented results from a phase 2b clinical trial demonstrating significant improvement in recurrence-free survival in patients with high-risk melanoma who were treated with a combination of an investigational personalized mRNA-based vaccine plus the immune checkpoint inhibitor pembrolizumab (Keytruda), compared with pembrolizumab alone. Read More ›

Vaccination against human papillomavirus can prevent several types of cancer, including cervical, oral/oropharyngeal, penile, and anal cancers. Read More ›

Young women with early-stage, hormone receptor (HR)-positive breast cancer attempting to become pregnant can safely pause endocrine therapy and resume it later, according to initial results from the international POSITIVE trial. Read More ›

Ibrutinib (Imbruvica) may allow patients with newly diagnosed mantle-cell lymphoma (MCL) to forego autologous stem-cell transplantation (ASCT), according to results of the 3-arm randomized TRIANGLE clinical trial presented at the 64th American Society of Hematology Annual Meeting and Exposition. Read More ›

Results from a new study found that radiation oncologists tend to discuss sexual side effects in women undergoing treatment for cervical cancer far less frequently than they discuss sexual side effects in men undergoing treatment for prostate cancer. Read More ›

Updated results from the ECHELON-1 clinical trial showed that the combination of brentuximab vedotin (Adcetris; BV) plus doxorubicin, vinblastine, and dacarbazine (AVD) as first-line therapy improves overall survival (OS) in patients with stage III-IV classical Hodgkin lymphoma compared with standard therapy with doxorubicin, bleomycin, vinblastine, and dacarbazine (ABVD). Read More ›

A shortened course of radiation therapy is safe and effective for men with high-risk prostate cancer, according to the results of the phase 3 Prostate Cancer Study 5 (PCS5) trial. Read More ›

The use of low-molecular-weight heparin (LMWH) did not improve the rate of live births among pregnant women with inherited thrombophilia and recurrent miscarriage, according to results of a clinical trial presented during the 64th American Society of Hematology Annual Meeting and Exposition. Read More ›

According to findings from a phase 3 trial presented at the American Society for Radiation Oncology Annual Meeting 2022, the addition of stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT) to sorafenib (Nexavar) can lengthen overall survival (OS) and delay tumor progression in patients with unresectable advanced hepatocellular cancer (HCC) without compromising quality of life. Read More ›

A head-to-head phase 3 clinical trial in patients with relapsed or refractory chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL)/small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL) has found that zanubrutinib (Brukinsa), a next-generation Bruton tyrosine kinase (BTK) inhibitor, was more effective at preventing disease progression and is better tolerated than ibrutinib (Imbruvica), a first-generation BTK inhibitor that is the current standard of care for this population of patients. Read More ›

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New results from the PATHFINDER clinical trial suggest that a multicancer early detection blood test can accurately identify the presence of cancer in apparently healthy people. Read More ›

In the phase 3 DETERMINATION trial—in which patients with newly diagnosed multiple myeloma were randomly assigned to a standard triplet regimen with and without autologous stem-cell transplantation (ASCT), with all receiving lenalidomide (Revlimid) maintenance therapy until disease progression—patients with ASCT had significantly longer progression-free survival (PFS) versus those who did not, but no difference in overall survival (OS) was observed between the 2 treatment arms. Read More ›

Although it is well established that air pollution is associated with lung cancer, how this occurs has not been well described. Read More ›

Endocrine therapy after breast-conserving surgery may be the only treatment needed in patients aged ≥55 years with low-grade luminal type A breast cancer, sparing them radiation therapy, including its side effects, financial burden, and inconvenience, according to findings from the single-arm LUMINA clinical trial reported at the 2022 American Society of Clinical Oncology Annual Meeting. Read More ›

Dual immune checkpoint inhibition with the anti–PD-L1 antibody durvalumab (Imfinzi) and the investigational anti–CTLA-4 antibody tremelimumab combined with platinum-based chemotherapy showed promising clinical activity and a favorable safety profile in the neoadjuvant setting for patients with advanced ovarian cancer, according to results of a single-arm phase 2 study presented during the 2022 American Association for Cancer Research annual meeting. Read More ›

According to data from the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Survey on COVID-19 in Oncology Registry, black or African-American patients with cancer and COVID-19 were more likely than non-Hispanic white patients to experience delays or disruptions in cancer treatment during the pandemic. Read More ›

>Sotorasib (Lumakras) continues to demonstrate durable efficacy in non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) with KRAS p.G12C mutation at 2-year follow-up of the phase 2 CodeBreaK 100 clinical trial. Read More ›

The addition of the PARP inhibitor niraparib (Zejula) to abiraterone acetate (Zytiga) plus prednisone (AAP) led to a significant improvement in radiographic progression-free survival (PFS) versus AAP alone in men with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (mCRPC) harboring homologous recombination repair (HRR) gene alterations, according to the final analysis of the primary end point of a phase 3 trial. Read More ›

Patients with cancer and immunoglobulin deficiency have compromised immune systems–based response to COVID-19 vaccines. Read More ›

Dostarlimab (Jemperli), an anti–PD-1 monoclonal antibody, demonstrated a 100% clinical complete response rate among 14 patients with mismatch repair-deficient (dMMR) locally advanced rectal cancer, according to the results of a recent clinical trial. Read More ›

Adjuvant pembrolizumab (Keytruda) continued to provide a disease-free survival (DFS) benefit in patients with renal-cell carcinoma (RCC) at intermediate-high or high risk of recurrence after nephrectomy, according to 30-month follow-up data from the KEYNOTE-564 trial presented at the 2022 ASCO Genitourinary Cancers Symposium. Read More ›

The use of a polygenic score (PGS) based on noncancer genetic variations in prostate-specific antigen (PSA) values helped to refine PSA screening in a large group of men without prostate cancer at baseline. Read More ›

The number of cancer survivors continues to increase in the United States, which can be attributed to a growing and aging population, as well as recent advances in diagnosis and treatment. The Institute of Medicine advises that every cancer survivor receive a survivorship care plan summarizing his or her diagnosis, treatment, and recommendations regarding follow-up care. Read More ›

Treatment with acalabrutinib (Calquence) elicited a complete or partial response in more than 50% of patients with relapsed or refractory marginal zone lymphoma (MZL), according to interim results of a phase 2 study presented by L. Elizabeth Budde, MD, PhD, Associate Professor, Hematology & Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation, City of Hope, Duarte, CA, at the 2022 American Society of Clinical Oncology Annual Meeting. Read More ›

According to results presented at the 2021 ASH Annual Meeting and Exposition, new sequencing technologies may overcome previous limitations of circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) profiling in patients with central nervous system (CNS) lymphoma. Using ultrasensitive sequencing, researchers were able to diagnose the disease based on ctDNA mutational profiles. Read More ›

The addition of sacituzumab govitecan (Trodelvy), an antibody–drug conjugate, to the PD-1 inhibitor pembrolizumab (Keytruda) showed encouraging antitumor activity in checkpoint inhibitor–naïve patients with metastatic urothelial cancer, according to an analysis of the results of cohort 3 from the phase 2 TROPHY-U-01 clinical trial, which were presented at the 2022 American Society of Clinical Oncology Genitourinary Cancers Symposium by Petros Grivas, MD, PhD, Clinical Director, Genitourinary Cancers Program, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle; and Associate Professor, Clinical Research Division, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle. Read More ›

Final results from the pivotal phase 3 KEYNOTE-355 trial showed that the addition of pembrolizumab (Keytruda) to chemotherapy resulted in a statistically significant and clinically meaningful improvement in overall survival (OS) compared with chemotherapy alone in patients with metastatic triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) whose tumors expressed PD-L1 with a combined positive score (CPS) ≥10. Read More ›

According to data from a European registry, approximately 1 in 6 patients with cancer who recovered from COVID-19 infection experienced long-term sequelae (ie, “long-haul” COVID-19), placing them at increased risk for death or discontinuation of anticancer treatment. Read More ›

Adagrasib (MRTX849), an inhibitor of the KRAS^G12C mutation, showed promising activity as monotherapy and in combination with cetuximab (Erbitux) in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer (CRC) in the phase 1/2 KRYSTAL-1 trial. Read More ›

Two years of abiraterone acetate (Zytiga) plus prednisone added to androgen-deprivation therapy (ADT) improved metastasis-free survival and overall survival compared with ADT alone in men with nonmetastatic castration-sensitive prostate cancer, whereas the addition of enzalutamide (Xtandi) to ADT had no benefit, and much greater toxicity. Read More ›

Patritumab deruxtecan (HER3-DxD), an investigational antibody–drug conjugate targeting the HER3 growth factor receptor, showed promising activity in patients with locally advanced or metastatic EGFR mutation–positive non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who had received previous EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) therapy, according to interim results from a phase 1 dose-escalation and dose-expansion trial. Read More ›

ALK inhibitor therapy achieved “remarkable” response rates in a small study of patients with ALK-positive adult-onset neuroblastoma. Some patients who did not respond to initial treatment with 1 ALK inhibitor had a subsequent response to lorlatinib (Lorbrena), which had the best showing among ALK inhibitors evaluated in this setting. The results of this retrospective study were presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology 2021 virtual annual meeting. Read More ›

Dual EGFR targeting with amivantamab-vmjw (Rybrevant) plus lazertinib (Leclaza) led to durable responses in more than one-third of chemotherapy-naïve patients with EGFR-positive non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) whose disease had progressed on osimertinib (Tagrisso) therapy, according to a cohort analysis of the CHRYSALIS trial. Read More ›

Treatment with tebentafusp (IMCgp100), a novel bispecific T-cell receptor (TCR) fusion protein, extended survival in patients with metastatic uveal melanoma, according to the results from a recent phase 3 trial. Read More ›

Neoadjuvant nivolumab (Opdivo) plus chemotherapy significantly improved pathologic complete response (pCR) rates versus chemotherapy alone in patients with resectable stage IB-IIIA non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), according to final results from the CheckMate-816 clinical trial. Read More ›

Researchers have identified 2 inherited pathogenic genetic variants in patients with pediatric neuroblastoma, according to results from a study presented at the 2021 virtual American Association for Cancer Research annual meeting. Read More ›

Approximately 13% of patients with lung adenocarcinoma harbor the KRAS p.G12C mutation, which is associated with poor clinical outcomes. Read More ›

The addition of the PI3K inhibitor copanlisib (Aliopa) to rituximab (Rituxan) reduced the risk for disease progression or death by 48% compared with rituximab alone in patients with relapsed indolent non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) in the phase 3 CHRONOS-3 clinical trial. Read More ›

The COVID-19 pandemic caused significant disruptions to virtually all aspects of oncology care. Read More ›

Belzutifan, an oral, novel hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF)-2α inhibitor, showed encouraging activity as a single agent in heavily pretreated patients with advanced clear-cell renal-cell carcinoma (RCC) associated with von Hippel-Lindau (VHL) disease, as well as impressive tumor shrinkage when used in combination with cabozantinib (Cabometyx) in separate studies presented at the virtual 2021 ASCO Genitourinary Cancers Symposium. Read More ›

Pembrolizumab (Keytruda) plus chemotherapy improved progression-free survival (PFS) compared with chemotherapy alone as first-line treatment of metastatic triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC), according to the results of KEYNOTE-355. Read More ›

The addition of the cyclin-dependent kinase (CDK)4/6 inhibitor abemaciclib (Verzenio) to standard endocrine therapy reduced the risk for invasive disease recurrence or death compared with endocrine therapy alone by almost 30% in patients with high-risk, hormone receptor (HR)-positive, human epidermal growth receptor 2 (HER2)-negative, early-stage breast cancer. Read More ›

In patients with metastatic urothelial cancer who received previous therapy, as well as in cisplatin-ineligible patients with this cancer, enfortumab vedotin-ejfv (Padcev) improved overall survival (OS), according to new data presented at the virtual 2021 ASCO Genitourinary Cancers Symposium. Read More ›

Momelotinib, a selective and orally bioavailable inhibitor of Janus kinase (JAK) 1, JAK2, and ACVR1, improved overall survival and sustained efficacy outcomes in patients with intermediate- or high-risk myelofibrosis, according to updated findings from the phase 3 SIMPLIFY-1 and SIMPLIFY-2 clinical trials presented at ASH 2020. Read More ›

In the phase 3 clinical trial REACH3, ruxolitinib (Jakafi) led to superior overall response rates and durable responses compared with best available therapy (ie, control group) in patients with steroid-dependent or steroid-refractory chronic graft-versus-host disease (GVHD), with acceptable safety. Read More ›

Sotorasib, an investigational small-molecule inhibitor of the KRAS p.G12C mutation, demonstrated promising activity and encouraging safety in patients with advanced solid tumors, in particular those with non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), in the preliminary phase 1 CodeBreaK 100 trial. Read More ›

Xevinapant, an investigational antagonist of IAPs (inhibitor of apoptosis proteins), prolonged overall survival (OS) in patients with locally advanced head and neck squamous-cell carcinoma (HNSCC) when added to chemoradiotherapy, according to an updated analysis of a phase 2 clinical trial that was presented at the 2020 European Society for Medical Oncology congress. Read More ›

First-line treatment with the high-affinity, highly potent PD-1 inhibitor cemiplimab-rwlc (Libtayo) significantly improved overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) compared with standard platinum-based chemotherapy in patients with advanced non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and PD ligand 1 (PD-L1) expression on at least 50% of tumor cells. Read More ›

Lorlatinib (Lorbrena) significantly improved progression-free survival (PFS) and intracranial response rates compared with the former standard of care, crizotinib (Xalkori), as first-line treatment for patients with advanced ALK-positive non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), as reported in a planned interim analysis of the CROWN trial. Read More ›

Although smoldering myeloma is acknowledged as a clinical entity, debate continues about whether to treat, when to treat, and how to treat this condition, said Natalie S. Callander, MD, Leader, Myeloma/Lymphoma Disease-Oriented Team, University of Wisconsin Carbone Cancer Center, Madison, at the National Comprehensive Cancer Network 2020 Virtual Congress: hematologic malignancies. Read More ›

At the National Comprehensive Cancer Network 2020 Virtual Congress: Hematalogic Malignancies, Shaji Kumar, MD, Consultant and Professor of Medicine, Division of Hematology, Mayo Clinic Cancer Center, Rochester, MN, discussed the “bonanza of treatment regimens for multiple myeloma.” Read More ›

Although chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy has been a life-saving treatment for some patients with relapsed or refractory diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), additional therapies may be able to perform equally well in select patients, said Andrew D. Zelenetz, MD, PhD, Medical Director, Quality Informatics, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York City, at the National Comprehensive Cancer Network 2020 Virtual Congress: hematologic malignancies. Read More ›

Many cancer vaccines have been studied, but thus far the search has been unsuccessful. Results from a new study suggest that the combination of a messenger (mRNA)-­based personalized cancer vaccine (known as RO7198457) plus the PD-L1 inhibitor atezolizumab (Tecentriq) shows promise for the treatment of advanced cancer. Read More ›

PARP inhibition is moving on from breast and ovarian cancer to the treatment of patients with prostate cancer and BRCA1/2 mutation. Olaparib (Lynparza) reduced the risk for death by 31% versus enzalutamide (Xtandi) or abiraterone (Zytiga) in men with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) and BRCA1 or BRCA2, and to a lesser extent ATM mutations, according to the final analysis of the phase 3 PROfound trial. Read More ›

Early locoregional therapy with surgery and radiation does not improve overall survival (OS) in women with newly diagnosed stage IV breast cancer and an intact primary tumor compared with systemic therapy alone, according to the results of the randomized ECOG-ACRIN E2108 phase 3 clinical trial. Read More ›

Oral relugolix given daily is superior to standard androgen-deprivation therapy (ADT) with leuprolide in men with advanced prostate cancer, according to the results of the phase 3 HERO study. In June, the FDA granted a priority review for relugolix, an oral gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) antagonist, for the treatment of advanced prostate cancer. Read More ›

One question on oncologists’ minds recently is whether treatment with immune checkpoint inhibitors in patients with cancer has a negative effect on COVID-19 disease. So far, the data have not shown a deleterious effect, but the definitive answer is unknown. Read More ›

During the July 2020 AACR virtual meeting on COVID-19 and cancer, Solange Peters, MD, PhD, European Society for Medical Oncology President, and Head, Medical Oncology Department, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois, Lausanne, Switzerland, delivered the keynote address, providing an update on the COVID-19 and Cancer Consortium cohort study. Read More ›

“COVID-19 is more than just the common cold. It represents a perpetual challenge for which we have to be perpetually prepared,” stated Anthony S. Fauci, MD, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), in his keynote lecture at the July 2020 AACR virtual meeting on COVID-19 and cancer. Dr Fauci has been Director of NIAID for 36 years. Read More ›

A real-world analysis showed that adjuvant immunotherapy in patients with stage III melanoma improved survival, but that only approximately 33% of eligible patients received such adjuvant therapy after ipilimumab (Yervoy) was approved by the FDA for this indication. Read More ›

The combination of cabozantinib (Cabometyx), a second-generation tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI), plus nivolumab (Opdivo), an immune checkpoint inhibitor, significantly improved overall survival (OS) and doubled the objective response rates (ORR) compared with the current standard, sunitinib (Sutent), in treatment-naïve patients with advanced renal-cell carcinoma (RCC), according to the results of the phase 3 CheckMate-9ER clinical trial. Read More ›

Adding the oral cyclin-dependent kinase (CDK)4/CDK6 inhibitor abemaciclib (Verzenio) to endocrine therapy led to a significant reduction in the risk for invasive disease recurrence versus endocrine therapy alone in patients with high-risk hormone receptor (HR)-positive, HER2-negative early-stage breast cancer, according to findings from the phase 3 monarchE clinical trial. The results were presented at the 2020 European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) virtual meeting and were featured at the meeting press conference. Read More ›

Updated results of the phase 3 CASPIAN clinical trial continue to show that durvalumab (Imfinzi) added to standard chemotherapy improves overall survival (OS) for patients with treatment-naïve extensive-stage small-cell lung cancer (ES-SCLC), according to a presentation at the ASCO 2020 virtual annual meeting. Read More ›

Adjuvant therapy with atezolizumab (Tecentriq) did not meet the primary end point of disease-free survival (DFS) in patients with muscle-invasive urothelial cancer (MIUC) at high risk for recurrence versus observation alone in the primary analysis of the IMvigor010 trial. Read More ›

Interim analysis of the phase 3 JAVELIN Bladder 100 clinical trial showed that maintenance therapy with the PD-L1 inhibitor avelumab (Bavencio) plus best supportive care significantly prolonged overall survival (OS) versus best supportive care alone in patients with advanced urothelial carcinoma whose disease did not progress with first-line platinum-based chemotherapy. Read More ›