Interviews

David Polsky, MD, PhD, discusses the findings from a liquid biopsy analysis of the COMBI-d trial, which is a phase III trial investigating the combination of dabrafenib and trametinib or dabrafenib alone in patients with BRAF V600E/K–mutant melanoma. Investigators found an association between the presence of baseline circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) and a poor prognosis with the treatment of BRAF inhibitors.

Simon Rule, MD, PhD, discusses the current treatment approaches for patients with mantle cell lymphoma in both the United Kingdom and the United States. He says treatment strategies are pretty well established on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.

Howard S. Hochester, MD, discusses findings from the pooled safety analysis of TAS-102 in previously treated patients with colorectal cancer and gastric/gastroesophageal junction adenocarcinoma.

Matthew Galsky, MD, discusses how the phase II HCRN GU14-182 study helps to define the role of switch maintenance therapy in patients with urothelial cancer. The study looked at maintenance with pembrolizumab versus placebo following frontline chemotherapy in patients with metastatic urothelial cancer.

Naval G. Daver, MD, discusses how the efficacy compares between first- and second-generation FLT3 inhibitors in acute myeloid leukemia.

Alain Borczuk, MD, discusses the current role for liquid biopsies versus tissue biopsies in lung cancer and the challenges that need to be overcome in this space.

Martin E. Gutierrez, MD, director, Drug Discovery/Phase I Unit, and co-chief and medical oncologist, Divisions of Thoracic Oncology and Gastrointestinal Oncology, John Theurer Cancer Center, Hackensack University Medical Center, discusses the early findings for H3B-6527, an FGFR4 inhibitor, as a treatment of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) or intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma

Evan Y. Yu, MD, discussed the key takeaways from the phase Ib/II KEYNOTE-365 trial, which evaluated different novel pembrolizumab (Keytruda) combinations in patients with metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer.

Charu Aggarwal, MD, MPH, the Leslye M. Heisler Assistant Professor for Lung Cancer Excellence at Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania, and other researchers conducted a prospective study using next-generation sequencing as a biomarker to predict response and progression-free survival rates in patients with non–small cell lung cancer  receiving pembrolizumab monotherapy. The data were presented during the 2019 ASCO Annual Meeting.

Ana Oaknin, MD, head of the Gynecologic Tumors Unit, Vall d’Hebron University Hospital, and principal investigator, Gynecological Malignancies Group, explains the rationale for analyzing anti–PD-1 monotherapy with dostarlimab in patients with microsatellite instability–high and microsatellite stable endometrial cancer. 

Karim Fizazi, MD, PhD,head of the Department of Cancer Medicine,&nbsp;Institut Gustave Roussy, University of Paris-Sud, gives highlights on the updated findings from the phase III ARAMIS trial using darolutamide for the treatment of patients with nonmetastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer, recently presented during the 2019 ASCO Annual Meeting.&nbsp;<br /> &nbsp;

Pancreatic cancer with&nbsp;<em>BRCA1</em>and&nbsp;<em>BRCA2&nbsp;</em>mutations has shown positive responses to the PARP inhibitor olaparib in preliminary trials.&nbsp;

Jurgen Wolf, MD, discusses the importance of broad genomic testing to identify alterations in patients with advanced non&ndash;small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). By identifying molecular alterations and driver mutations early on, patients can receive matched targeted therapies at a time in the course of disease when the treatments would have the greatest impact.

Mark G. Kris, MD, discusses the importance of delaying relapse in patients with&nbsp;<em>EGFR</em>-positive non&ndash;small cell lung cancer. He shares the significance of the findings from the phase III RELAY trial, where the goal was to delay the time to relapse by adding ramucirumab to erlotinib.

Phillipe Moreau, MD, discusses the results from the randomized, open-label, multicenter phase III CASSIOPEIA trial. The results of the trial led to&nbsp;a priority review designation from the FDA for the combination of daratumumab plus bortezomib, thalidomide, and dexamethasone for patients with treatment-na&iuml;ve multiple myeloma who are candidates for autologous stem cell transplant.

<em>FLT3</em> mutation analysis in laboratories has brought on reimbursement barriers in clinical oncology. Jordan Clark, chief commercial officer, Diaceutics, a diagnostic development and commercialization company, spoke to <em>Targeted Oncology</em> about the cause of reimbursement issues and how the problem affects all parties involved.

Alexander D. Guminski, MD, PhD, discusses the 12-month follow-up data from a phase II study investigating the role of cemiplimab as a treatment for patients with metastatic cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma.

Hussain Borghaei, DO, MS, discusses the significance of the overall survival data update from the KEYNOTE-001 trial. This trial investigated the PD-1 inhibitor pembrolizumab as a treatment for patients with advanced non&ndash;small cell lung cancer.

Lori A. Leslie, MD, discusses the rationale for investigating the PI3K-delta inhibitor umbralisib in patients with relapsed or refractory marginal zone lymphoma in a multi-center, open-label phase II study. On trial, only patients with MZL were enrolled who had received at least 1 prior line of therapy. These patients received single-agent umbralisib once daily until progression or unacceptable toxicity.

Nikhil I. Khushalani, MD, discusses the rationale for combining nivolumab with bempegaldesleukin for the treatment of patients with newly diagnosed, unresectable or metastatic melanoma in a randomized, open-label phase III trial.

Debu Tripathy, MD, of the Department of Breast Medical Oncology, Division of Cancer Medicine, MD Anderson Cancer Center, was an investigator in the phase III MONALEESA-7 trial. The purpose of the study was to examine how endocrine therapy, in combination with a cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor, affects progression-free survival and overall survival in premenopausal patients with HR-positive, HER2-negative advanced breast cancer.

Addressing the need for treatments that are more effective and less toxic for patients with relapsed or refractory chronic lymphocytic leukemia, Paolo Ghia, MD, of the Universita Vita-Salute San Raffaele, and other researchers conducted a phase III randomized, multicentric ASCEND study, testing acalabrutinib monotherapy in comparison with physician&rsquo;s choice of standard regimens in patients R/R CLL.

Ghanshyam Yadav, MD, a first-year resident in Obstetrics Gynecology &amp; Reproductive Services, Baylor College of Medicine, talks through the results of a preclinical trial that found synergy in the combination of the PARP inhibitor olaparib and the pan-HER tyrosine kinase inhibitor neratinib for uterine serous cancers that overexpress HER2.

Hanneke Poort, PhD, discusses the burden of cancer-related fatigue in women with gynecologic cancers; she also highlights a new intervention technique that is being used at Dana-Farber for these patients.

Andrew Turk, MD, discusses the importance of discussing thyroid cancer at major meetings, such as the 2019 ASCO Annual Meeting. It is important for physicians to keep up to date on the latest advancements for treatment options and new understandings of the disease and its subtypes.

Ruben Mesa, MD, discusses the results from a reanalysis of the phase II JAKARTA-2 study in patients with myelofibrosis (MF) who received a previous treatment of ruxolitinib (Jakafi) and failed treatment.

David Spigel, MD, chief scientific officer, Sarah Cannon Research Institute, director of the Lung cancer Research Program, and member of the Association of Community Cancer Centers explains to <em>Targeted Oncology, </em>the ways in which ACCC is improving the care landscape and outcomes for patients with advanced non&ndash;small cell lung cancer.

The Rapid Integration Program, a training initiative for new physician&rsquo;s assistants and nurse practitioners working in the field of oncology, is a Florida Society of Community Oncology (FLASCO) initiative that came from an ASCO meeting. Winston Tan, MD, of the Head and Neck Cancer Center at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida, speaking during the 2019 ASCO Annual Meeting, was in attendance at the 2016 ASCO Annual Meeting when the idea for a training program was first introduced.<br /> &nbsp;

Ezzat Elhassadi, MD, a consultant hematologist at the University Hospital Waterford in Ireland, discusses the therapeutic approach for different subtypes of mantle cell lymphoma. MCL is a spectrum of diseases that should be treated differently, he says.

Susan Friedman, executive director and founder, FORCE, a non-profit organization supporting education, advocacy, and research around breast and ovarian cancer, explains the relevance of PARP inhibitors and the recent developments in oncology research that may improve cancer treatment for patients with genetic mutations.