News

Interim phase II trial data showed that the combination of enasidenib, an oral small molecule inhibitor of mutant IDH2 proteins, and azacitidine, significantly improves complete remission and overall responses in patients with newly diagnosed acute myeloid leukemia with IDH2 mutations compared with azacitidine alone, according to results presented at the 2019 American Society of Hematology Annual Meeting.

Enzalutamide is now approved by the FDA for the treatment of metastatic castration-sensitive prostate cancer, making it the first oral agent to be approved for three different types of advanced prostate cancer, according to a press release from Pfizer.<br /> &nbsp;

The Association of Community Cancer Centers has partnered with the AIM at Melanoma Foundation to develop resources through its Multidisciplinary Cutaneous Squamous Cell Carcinoma Care education project to help provide physicians with more information to guide them in the diagnosis and treatment of patients with this type of nonmelanoma skin cancer, according to a press release from ACCC.

MI Genomic Profiling Similarity Score, the latest addition to the comprehensive genomic profiling armamentarium at Caris Life Sciences, has been launched, according to a press release from the company

A New Drug Application for ripretinib was submitted to the FDA for the treatment of patients with advanced gastrointestinal stromal tumor who have received a prior treatment of imatinib, sunitinib, and regorafenib, according to a press release from Deciphera Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

Pembrolizumab showed improvements in overall survival, progression-free survival, and objective response rate compared with pemetrexed or paclitaxel chemotherapy in patients with metastatic nonsquamous non&ndash;small cell lung cancer whose tumors are PD-L1&ndash;positive, regardless of their&nbsp;KRAS&nbsp;mutational status.

Historically, colorectal cancer has been viewed as a common cancer among elderly patients. The average age at diagnosis of patients with colorectal cancer in the United States is 67 years,&nbsp;in which a screening colonoscopy remains the gold standard of care for prevention and is recommended for all individuals &gt;50 years of age.

In an interview with&nbsp;Targeted Oncology, Brennan J. Decker, MD, PhD, discussed a real-life scenario of a patient with lung cancer who harbored both an&nbsp;EGFR&nbsp;and&nbsp;BRAF&nbsp;mutation. He highlighted the key takeaways of this case, which he presented at the 2019 Association for Molecular Pathology Annual Meeting and Expo.

The United States Senate has voted to confirm Stephen M. Hahn, MD, FASTRO, as commissioner of Food and Drugs, Department of Health and Human Services during a U.S. Senate floor proceeding held on Thursday, December 12, 2019, according to a press release from the HHS. The vote was 72 to 18.

Preliminary data showed that the combination of sitravatinib and tislelizumab is well tolerated and may promote antitumor activity when administered to patients with platinum-resistant ovarian cancer, according to a press release from BieGene, Ltd, which reported data from a phase Ib study at the 2019 European Society of Oncology Immuno-Oncology Congress in Geneva, Switzerland.<br /> &nbsp;

During a Targeted Oncology&trade; case-based peer perspectives live discussion, Ravi&nbsp;Vij,&nbsp;MD, MBA, professor, Department of Medicine, Oncology Division, Bone Marrow Tranplantation &amp; Leukemia, Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis spoke with a group of oncologists about best practices for treating patients with multiple myeloma. The ideas he presented were based on a real case of a male patient with multiple myeloma.

With the inevitability of resistance to first- and second-generation EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitors in patients with EGFR-mutant non&ndash;small cell lung cancer, novel options like lazertinib, an irreversible, third-generation, mutant-selective, EGFR TKI are being explored. Lazertinib has shown promise for the treatment of this patient population, according to a phase I/II dose-escalation study published in The Lancet Oncology.

The combination of atezolizumab, cobimetinib, and vemurafenib reduced the risk of disease progression or death compared with placebo in patients with&nbsp;BRAF&nbsp;V600 mutation-positive advanced melanoma, meeting the primary endpoint of progression-free survival in the phase III IMspire150 study, according to a press release from Roche.

In a&nbsp;Targeted Oncology&nbsp;case-based peer perspectives live discussion, Nathan A. Pennell, MD, PhD, associate professor of the Department of Medicine at Case Western Reserve University and a medical oncologist at Taussig Cancer Center and the Cleveland Clinic Cancer Center discussed treatment options for EGFR-mutant non&ndash;small cell lung cancer, based on the case of a real patient.<br /> &nbsp;

Some HNSCCs are characterized by exclusion of immune cells, and the presence of indoleamine-dioxygenase&nbsp;and myeloid-derived suppressor cells indicates a suppressive tumor microenvironment. The PD-1&ndash;directed antibodies pembrolizumab and nivolumab and the PD-L1&ndash;directed antibodies durvalumab, and atezolizumab have demonstrated single-agent activity in HNSCC, leading to multicenter phase Ib, II, and III trials defining new standards of care in recurrent/ metastatic HNSCC.

New results from the KEYNOTE-164 trial have shown that patients with previously treated microsatellite instability-high DNA mismatch repair advanced or metastatic colorectal cancer who received pembrolizumab responded well to the drug.

Following the 2019 ASH Annual Meeting,&nbsp;Targeted Oncology&nbsp;spoke with experts from various specialties in hematology. The experts highlighted some of the top abstracts from the meeting that will impact the way multiple myeloma, leukemias, MPNs, and lymphomas are treated.

In an interview with&nbsp;Targeted Oncology, Jorge J. Castillo, MD, discussed the findings from the prospective phase II trial evaluating venetoclax in patients with Waldenstr&ouml;m macroglobulinemia. He also addressed the unmet needs in this patient population and the next steps for research in the field.

A Biologics License Application for the investigational chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy agent, KTE-X19 has been submitted to the FDA for the treatment of adult patients with relapsed/refractory mantle cell lymphoma, according to a press release from Kite.<br /> &nbsp;

Cancer has historically been divided between localized and metastatic disease. The underlying principle, derived from the Halsted theory of cancer progression, is that once cancer has spread to other sites, it is a systemic disease. Heroic efforts to remove or ablate all evidence of visible cancer thus would expose patients to toxicity without a chance for benefit.

A retrospective study has shown that only 40% of patients with metastatic colorectal cancer received biomarker testing prior to treatment, as recommended in the National Comprehensive Cancer Network guidelines. As a result, patients receive less effective therapies and experience serious adverse events, according to a press release from Guardant Health.

The phase III BELLINI trial demonstrated translocation 11;14 and high&nbsp;BCL2&nbsp;gene expression are predictive of response to treatment with the addition of venetoclax to bortezomib plus dexamethasone in patients with relapsed/refractory multiple myeloma, according to the findings presented at the 2019 ASH Annual Meeting.

In an interview with&nbsp;Targeted Oncology, Thomas Yau, MD, discussed the findings from the phase III CheckMate trial evaluating nivolumab in patients with advanced hepatocellular carcinoma compared with standard-of-care sorafenib. He highlighted the next steps for the trial following these data, which were presented at the 2019 European Society of Medical Oncology Congress.

Zotiraciclib has been granted Orphan Drug Designation by the FDA for the treatment of patients with glioblastoma, according to a press release from Adastra Pharmaceuticals, Inc.

&nbsp;In a&nbsp;<em>Targeted Oncology&nbsp;</em>case-based peer perspectives live discussion with a group of physicians, C. Ola Landgren, MD, PhD, reviewed several combination regimens used in the treatment of multiple myeloma. Landgren, chief of the Myeloma Service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, used the case of a 51-year-old man with standard-risk disease to highlight the benefits and drawbacks of each therapy strategy.

In an interview with&nbsp;Targeted Oncology, Katja Weisel, MD, discussed the safety findings of the 4-drug chemotherapy regimen in the GMMG-CONCEPT trial, which were presented at the 17^th&nbsp;International Myeloma Workshop.

In the phase III CANDOR trial, the addition of daratumumab to carfilzomib and dexamethasone reduced the risk of disease progression or death by 37% compared with carfilzomib and dexamethasone alone in patients with relapsed/refractory multiple myeloma, according to findings from the phase III CANDOR trial presented at the 2019<br /> American Society of Hematology Annual Meeting.

Patients with relapsed/refractory mantle cell lymphoma experienced a 67% complete remission rate and an objective response rate of 93% after treatment with the anti-CD19 CAR T-cell therapy KTE-X19, according to findings from the phase II ZUMA-2 study presented at the 2019 American Society of Hematology ASH Annual Meeting.

The new phase III MOMENTUM clinical trial, which is evaluating the efficacy of momelotinib, a JAK1, JAK2 and ACVR1 inhibitor, versus active comparator danazol in patients with symptomatic and anemic myelofibrosis, was recently launched globally, according to a press release from Sierra Oncology.

A prospective trial showed that treatment with ibrutinib might prompt a decrease in &nbsp;progression-free survival in patients with relapsed or refractory mantle cell lymphoma, according to long-term follow-up data presented at the 2019 American Society for Hematology Annual Meeting and Exposition.