Latest Conference Articles

Clifford A. Hudis, MD, CEO of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, discusses the significance of the relationship between breast cancer and obesity.

When it comes to breast cancer treatments, sometimes less is more, according to Hope S. Rugo, MD.

A better understanding of how patients with triple-negative breast cancer respond to neoadjuvant therapy regimens is helping to further individualize therapy for patients while also informing treatment decisions in the adjuvant setting.

The addition of chemotherapy to standard hormonal therapy does not improve survival rates for patients with early breast cancer who are at low-risk for recurrence using the 21-gene recurrence score.

Angela M. DeMichele, MD, professor of Medicine and Epidemiology, University of Pennsylvania, discusses the biology of triple negative breast cancer and the significant role of DNA repair.

Single-agent abemaciclib as well as taselisib in combination with fulvestrant (Faslodex) could both play a substantial role in breast cancer in the near future, says Maura Dickler, MD.

Joanne Blum, MD, PhD, FACP, physician, Texas Oncology, discusses the combination of fulvestrant and palbociclib (Ibrance) in patients with breast cancer, as well as the synergy fulvestrant has with other CDK4/6 inhibitors.

A new nationwide research project is encouraging patients to share tumor samples and clinical information with researchers in the hope that it will lead to discoveries for new and improved treatment options and, ultimately, a cure, for metastatic breast cancer.

BRCA mutation testing in patients with ovarian cancer could mean a world of difference in treatment, says Robert Coleman, MD.

Early identification of BRCA mutations can significantly help inform future treatment choices for patients with ovarian cancer, says Leslie Randall, MD.

Ghassan K. Abou-Alfa, MD, medical oncologist, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, discusses the potential impact that regorafenib (Stivarga) could have on the treatment landscape of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).

Adding utomilumab (PF-05082566), a 4-1BB agonist, to pembrolizumab (Keytruda), a PD-1 inhibitor, was shown to be a safe and effective combination therapy for patients with different types of advanced solid tumors, according to findings from a phase Ib study presented at the 2016 ASCO Annual Meeting.

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.

A phase Ib expansion cohort of the Keynote-029 trial found that a combined regimen of pembrolizumab (Keytruda) at the standard dose (2 mg/kg) and ipilimumab (Yervoy) at a reduced dose (1 mg/kg) was safe and effective for patients with advanced melanoma.

Avelumab showed early positive survival data and lasting responses for patients with pretreated advanced or metastatic Merkel cell carcinoma, according to findings from the phase II JAVELIN Merkel 200 trial presented at the 2016 ASCO Annual Meeting.

Pembrolizumab (Keytruda), when studied in 2 clinical trials for the treatment of patients with pretreated recurrent or metastatic head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC), showed an objective response rate (ORR) of 18%, according to findings presented at the 2016 ASCO Annual Meeting.

Extending aromatase inhibitor (AI) treatment to 10 years post-treatment reduced the risk of recurrence in women with early-stage HR-positive breast cancer by more than a third. Findings of the MA.17R trial also showed that adjuvant therapy extension did not create any new toxicities or quality of life complications for patients.

Nivolumab (Opdivo) treatment provided antitumor responses in patients with microsatellite instability-high (MSI-H) metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC), whether given as a single agent or in combination with ipilimumab (Yervoy). Interim data from the phase II CheckMate-142 trial was presented at the 2016 ASCO Annual Meeting.

Keith T. Flaherty, MD, provides an overview of the phase III COMBI-d study, which examined the combination of dabrafenib (Tafinlar) and trametinib (Mekinist) as a treatment of patients with BRAF-mutant metastatic melanoma.

Heather A. Wakelee, MD, discusses a study utilizing liquid biopsies in patients with non-small cell lung cancer who harbor EGFR mutations.

Frontline treatment with alectinib reduced the risk of progression or death by 66% compared with crizotinib for patients with advanced or recurrent ALK-positive non-small cell lung cancer.

Three-year follow-up data from the phase III COMBI-d study was presented at the 2016 ASCO Annual Meeting, revealing impressive overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) data for the dabrafenib (Tafinlar) and trametinib (Mekinist) combination therapy for patients with BRAF-mutant metastatic melanoma.

Palbociclib (Ibrance), when added to letrozole, increased the median progression-free survival (PFS) rate in patients with ER-positive, HER2-negative advanced or metastatic breast cancer by >10 months, according to results from the phase III PALOMA-2 trial presented at the 2016 ASCO Annual Meeting.

Patients with recurrent glioblastoma mutliforme reacted well to nivolumab (Opdivo) monotherapy, according to findings from the CheckMate-143 trial that were presented at the 2016 ASCO Annual Meeting. The single agent showed a manageable safety profile and promising efficacy signs during the course of the study.

The advent of targeted inhibitors that work on the fibroblast growth factor receptor (FGFR) pathway may alter the disease course and outcomes in intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma, suggests data from a four-center retrospective study. Lead investigator Apurva Jain, MD, of the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center presented the findings at the 2016 ASCO Annual Meeting.

Maura N. Dickler, MD, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, discusses next steps with abemaciclib following the results of the single-arm MONARCH 1 trial.

A novel dual-pathway inhibitor of tumor angiogenesis passed a preliminary clinical test, demonstrating manageable toxicity and biomarker evidence of engagement with the drug's targets, as reported at the 2016 ASCO Annual Meeting in Chicago.

Plasma and urine tests are often a reliable method for the detection of the T790M mutation in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients with acquired resistance to EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs), according to an oral presentation given Monday at the 2016 ASCO Annual Meeting in Chicago.

Patients with BRAF-mutant melanoma obtained no survival benefit from combined treatment of anti-BRAF therapy and an immune checkpoint inhibitor, a retrospective analysis showed.

In patients with HER2-positive early breast cancer, data from a phase III trial has shown a significantly higher pathological complete response (pCR) rate with neoadjuvant docetaxel plus carboplatin plus trastuzumab plus pertuzumab versus trastuzumab emtansine plus pertuzumab.