Gastric Cancer

A novel combination regimen of ramucirumab plus pembrolizumab demonstrated modest activity in patients with previously treated gastric or gastroesophageal juncture cancer.

Ian Chau, MD, discusses interim safety and clinical activity results in patients with advanced gastric or gastroesophageal junction adenocarcinoma from a multi-cohort phase I study of ramucirumab plus pembrolizumab.

According to findings from the phase III ONO-4538-12 trial, treatment with nivolumab (Opdivo) reduced the risk of death by 37% compared with placebo for patients with advanced gastric or gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) cancer following second or later-line chemotherapy.

Christophe Mariette, MD, PhD, surgical oncologist and professor of surgery, University Hospital of Lille in France, discusses a nationwide study investigating the impact of age and comorbidities on postoperative mortality after esophageal and gastric cancer surgery.

An expert panel, consisting of the College of American Pathologists, American Society for Clinical Pathology, and the American Society of Clinical Oncology issued comprehensive, evidence-based guidelines for clinicians and pathologists regarding the testing of HER2 status for patients with gastroesophageal adenocarcinoma. 

The PD-1 inhibitor nivolumab extended overall survival versus placebo for patients who were refractory or intolerant to standard therapy with unresectable, advanced, or recurrent gastric cancer, according to topline data from the phase III ONO-4538-12 trial.

Newer agents, including immunotherapies and HER2 and VEGF-targeted therapies, are being investigated in gastric cancer, but the jury is still out on if these therapies will be beneficial, said David H. Ilson, MD, PhD, a medical oncologist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.<br /> &nbsp;

As gastric cancers continue to be classified into different subtypes, oncologists will now have the opportunity to improve treatment by determining which targeted agents are appropriate for which subtypes, said Howard S. Hochster, MD.<br /> &nbsp;

Srdan Verstovsek, MD, PhD, Chief, Section for Myeloproliferative Neoplasms at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, discusses the most recent developments in diagnosing polycythemia vera.

Adam Bass, MD, assistant professor of medicine, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, discusses the differentiation between the classes of gastric cancer.

Not all gastroesophageal junction cancers should be treated the same, according to Richard J. Bold, MD.

While the utilization of immunotherapy in gastric cancer may not be as clear cut as it is in melanoma or lung cancer, Zev Wainberg, MD, illustrates some trials where the therapy type is breaking through.

Adam Bass, MD, assistant professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, physician/scientist, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, discusses the importance of individualizing treatments for patients with gastric/esophageal cancer.

Apatinib demonstrated an improvement in overall survival by 1.8 months and an acceptable toxicity profile compared to placebo as treatment for advanced gastric cancer.

Hendrik-Tobias Arkenau, MD, PhD, founding medical director, executive medical director, Sarah Cannon Research Institute UK, gives an overview of the JAVELIN trial in gastric cancer. He also discusses the safety profile of avelumab.

IMAB362, a novel chimeric IgG1 backbone antibody highly specific for CLDN18.2, extended median overall survival by 4.8 months when added to standard chemotherapy in patients with advanced gastric cancer.

Understanding how gastric and esophageal cancers are triggered and their genetic makeup is vital to developing and testing new therapies.

Pre-operative chemotherapy alone in esophageal cancer may not be the best choice for patients undergoing resection.

Napabucasin, a STAT3-targeted agent, has received an orphan drug status from the FDA for the treatment of patients with gastric or gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) cancer.

Hendrik-Tobias Arkenau, MD, PhD, discusses the phase I JAVELIN trial as well as the future of treatments and immunotherapies in the treatment paradigm of gastrointestinal cancers.

Findings for the new immunotherapy agent targeting claudin18.2 (CLDN18.2) presented at the 2016 ASCO Annual Meeting raised the possibility of a new therapeutic agent in a tumor type with relatively few current options. When added to standard chemotherapy, the treatment reduced the risk of death or disease progression by approximately 50% for patients with CLDN18.2-positive advanced gastric cancers.

Neratinib, an experimental TKI being developed for breast cancer, achieved a 36% clinical benefit rate in a phase II trial, according to a poster presented June 5, 2016 at the ASCO Annual Meeting in Chicago.

Gastric cancers with high-level clonal FGFR2 gene amplification responded to AZD4547, a selective FGFR inhibitor, in a phase II open label trial of previously treated, advanced FGFR amplified cancer. Yet tumors with multiple FGFR1 genes, low level or subclonal amplification of FGFR2 did not respond similarly to the drug.

When a recent trial found that apatinib, an experimental VEGFR inhibitor, met its clinical endpoint and showed efficacy as a third-line therapy in treating advanced refractory stomach cancer, one might have expected at least two cheers. After all, gastric cancer is the third most fatal form of the disease globally, and there is currently no standard third-line treatment for advanced patients.

A meta-analysis found that treatment of the bacterium H pylori with antibiotics in a population at high risk for stomach cancer is associated with a reduced incidence rate of stomach cancer.