News

The PD-1 inhibitor nivolumab showed single-agent activity in previously treated patients with squamous cell carcinoma of the anal canal, resulting in an overall response rate of 24.3%.

Manish Shah, MD, discusses ongoing efforts to understand the distinction between early-onset CRC and traditional CRC.

Celestia Higano, MD, discusses the early use of chemotherapy, the potential for PARP inhibitors, and the evolving role of radium-223 in prostate cancer. 

According to findings from the phase III ALEX trial, alectinib reduced the risk of disease progression or death compared with crizotinib as a frontline treatment for patients with <em>ALK</em>-positive non&ndash;small cell lung cancer.&nbsp;

A majority of patients with relapsed or refractory indolent lymphoma responded to treatment with the PI3K dual-isoform inhibitor copanlisib, according to results from the phase II CHRONOS-1 trial.<br /> &nbsp;

A retrospective analysis presented at the 2017 AACR Annual Meeting found the flexibility of CAR T cells to perform multiple functions was associated with the level of clinical activity elicited for patients with advanced non-Hodgkin&rsquo;s lymphoma.

Combining the IDO inhibitor indoximod with pembrolizumab led to an overall response rate of 52% in patients with advanced melanoma.

The IDO1 inhibitor BMS-986205 had &quot;best-in-class&quot; activity as demonstrated by kynurenine reductions and IDO1 inhibition for patients with advanced tumors in a phase I/IIa study.

Adding a formulation of the Coxsackievirus A21 to ipilimumab yielded an overall response rate of 50% and was well-tolerated in immunotherapy-na&iuml;ve and pretreated patients with advanced melanoma.

Mutations in isocitrate dehydrogenase 1 and 2 (<em>IDH1/2</em>) are not the mutations commonly found in cancer cells, according to a presentation from the 2017 AACR Annual Meeting.

BGB-283, a novel agent that targets <em>RAS/RAF</em>-mutated tumors, demonstrated activity across a variety of tumor types, according to the results of a preliminary clinical evaluation presented at the 2017 AACR Annual Meeting.

More than 80% of patients with refractory non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL) achieved objective responses to treatment with the chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy axicabtagene ciloleucel (KTE-C19), according to the results of a pivotal phase II trial.

According to 5-year follow-up data&nbsp;from the CA209-003 study, long-term survival in patients with metastatic non&ndash;small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who received the immune checkpoint inhibitor nivolumab (Opdivo) has proven to be much higher than expected, with 16% of patients surviving after 5 years.

The PD-1 and CTLA-4 inhibitor combination of nivolumab (Opdivo) and ipilimumab (Yervoy) induced a 12% reduction in the risk of death versus nivolumab monotherapy in patients with treatment-na&iuml;ve advanced melanoma.

FDA approval is being sought for the use of denosumab for the prevention of skeletal-related events in patients with multiple myeloma, according to Amgen, the developer of the RANK ligand inhibitor.

Steven H. Lin, MD, PhD, discusses&nbsp;the benefits of advanced radiation technologies, including IMRT and proton therapy.

According to results of the phase II JAVELIN Merkel 200 study, the PD-L1 inhibitor avelumab (Bavencio) induced an objective response rate (ORR) of 33% in patients with advanced Merkel cell carcinoma, including 2 additional complete responses (CR) since the primary analysis.

&nbsp;According to the results of a phase I study of single agent anti-PD-L1 atezolizumab (Tecentriq) in metastatic triple-negative breast cancer (mTNBC), ten percent of patients showed impressive long-term survival, although researchers said that aside from some biomarker evidence, it&rsquo;s yet unclear why the drug was more effective in this subset of patients.

A landmark analysis of findings from the EF-14 trial testing the efficacy and safety of tumor treating fields for the treatment of patients with glioblastoma multiforme has found that the risk of death was reduced by 37% and overall survival was extended by a median of 5 months with the use of the device.

The combination of trastuzumab (Herceptin) and lapatinib (Tykerb) resulted in a 30% objective response rate (ORR) in heavily pretreated patients with HER2-positive metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC), suggesting a new targeted therapy strategy for later lines of treatment that supports testing for the aberration.

The irreversible pan-HER tyrosine kinase inhibitor neratinib showed single-agent activity across cohorts of patients with <em>HER2</em>-mutant advanced cancers, according to findings from the phase II SUMMIT study presented at the 2017 AACR Annual Meeting.

A biologics license application has been submitted for axicabtagene ciloleucel (KTE-C19) as a potential treatment for transplant ineligible patients with relapsed or refractory aggressive non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

The European Union has approved the combination of dabrafenib and trametinib for patients with <em>BRAF</em> V600-positive advanced or metastatic non-small cell lung cancer.&nbsp;

Palbociclib (Ibrance) has been granted a full approval by the FDA for use in combination with letrozole as a frontline treatment for postmenopausal women with ER-positive, HER2-negative metastatic breast cancer.

The American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) will recognize several individuals for their contributions to cancer research during its annual meeting, to be held April 1 to 5 in Washington, DC.

Osimertinib (Tagrisso) has been granted a full approval as a treatment for patients with metastatic EGFR T790M mutation-positive non&ndash;small cell lung cancer following prior treatment with an EGFR TKI.

A recent study found 12 new genetic variants were found that increase the risk of developing the disease and confirmed the association of 18 previously discovered variants.

The FDA has granted a priority review to a supplemental biologics license application (sBLA) supporting the conversion of the accelerated approval of blinatumomab (Blincyto) to a full approval as a treatment for patients with Philadelphia chromosome-negative (Ph-) relapsed/refractory B-precursor acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL).

Tisagenlecleucel-T (CTL019) has been granted a priority review designation by the FDA as a treatment for pediatric and young adult patients with relapsed and refractory B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia.

Subcutaneous rituximab has received the FDA&rsquo;s Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee (ODAC) unanimous (11-0) recommended approval for the treatment of patients with certain blood cancers.