scout

April 2018

A herpes zoster subunit vaccine effectively prevented episodes of HZ and other related complications among patients who had recently underwent autologous hematopoietic stem cell transplant, according to the results of the phase III ZOE-HSCT trial presented at the 2018 BMT Tandem Meetings.

When findings of larotrectinib, a pan-TRK inhibitor co-developed by Bayer and Loxo Oncology, that generated significant excitement for the treatment of both adult and pediatric patients with TRK fusion cancers, were presented during the 2017 ASCO Annual Meeting, the small molecule was lauded as a future standard of care for patients with advanced solid tumors harboring a TRK fusion.

Two poster presentations at the 2018 BMT Tandem Meetings of the Center for International Blood & Marrow Transplant Research and the American Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation, provided a compelling extension of the recent phase III clinical trial that demonstrated the efficacy of prophylactic therapy with letermovir (Prevymis) for the prevention of cytomeg alovirus (CMV) infection in patients receiving allogeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT).

Adoptive immunotherapy has shown promising outcomes in early-stage trials for many cancers, but successful approaches in head and neck cancers will require addressing several challenges that are inherent in many solid tumors, such as creating the right homing mechanisms, achieving adequate T-cell infiltration into the tumor, and finding an antigen that will not produce off-tumor effects.

Durvalumab showed encouraging antitumor activity both alone and in combination with tremelimumab for patients with PD-L1–low or –negative recurrent or metastatic head and neck squamous cell carcinoma, according to results of the CONDOR trial presented at the 2018 Multidisciplinary Head and Neck Cancer Symposium in Scottsdale, Arizona.