•   Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Excerpt:

    “Based on findings from the phase III KEYNOTE-407 trial, pembrolizumab (Keytruda) has been approved by the FDA for use in combination with carboplatin and either paclitaxel or nab-paclitaxel (Abraxane) for the frontline treatment of patients with metastatic squamous non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

    “Results from the trial showed combining pembrolizumab with chemotherapy reduced the risk of death by 36% compared with chemotherapy alone in patients with metastatic squamous NSCLC. The median overall survival (OS) was 15.9 months (95% CI, 13.2 – not evaluable) with pembrolizumab versus 11.3 months (95% CI, 9.5-14.8) with chemotherapy alone (HR, 0.64; 95% CI, 0.49-0.85; P = .0017). The OS benefit was observed regardless of PD-L1 expression level, choice of taxane, age, sex, and ECOG performance status.”

    Go to full article published by Targeted Oncology on Oct 30, 2018.

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  •   Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Excerpt:

    “Patients who underwent primary radical prostatectomy followed by radiotherapy for locally or regionally advanced prostate cancer had better survival outcomes than patients treated with radiotherapy plus androgen deprivation therapy, according to findings from a population-based, retrospective study published in Cancer.

    ” ‘There is a lot of debate about whether to remove the whole prostate and follow-up with radiation therapy or, as a second option, spare the prostate and treat it using radiation therapy plus hormone-blocking therapy,’ Grace Lu-Yao, PhD, associate director of population science at the Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center at Jefferson Health, said in a press release. ‘Our study suggests that removing the prostate followed by adjuvant radiotherapy is associated with greater OS in men with prostate cancer.’ ”

    Go to full article published by Healio on Oct 15, 2018.

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  •   Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Excerpt:

    “On October 16, 2018, the Food and Drug Administration approved talazoparib (TALZENNA, Pfizer Inc.), a poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor, for patients with deleterious or suspected deleterious germline BRCA-mutated (gBRCAm), HER2‑negative locally advanced or metastatic breast cancer. Patients must be selected for therapy based on an FDA-approved companion diagnostic for talazoparib.

    “Approval was based on EMBRACA (NCT01945775), an open‑label trial randomizing 431 patients (2:1) with gBRCAm HER2‑negative locally advanced or metastatic breast cancer to receive talazoparib (1 mg) or physician’s choice of chemotherapy (capecitabine, eribulin, gemcitabine, or vinorelbine). All patients were required to have a known deleterious or suspected deleterious gBRCA mutation and must have received no more than 3 prior cytotoxic chemotherapy regimens for locally advanced or metastatic disease. Patients were required to have received treatment with an anthracycline and/or a taxane (unless contraindicated) in the neoadjuvant, adjuvant, and/or metastatic treatment setting.”

    Go to full article published by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Oct 16, 2018.

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  •  

    The Promise of Plerixafor in Glioblastoma Treatment

    With: Adan Rios, MD

    A Q&A with Adan Rios, MD; Professor in the Division of Oncology-Department of Internal Medicine of The University of Texas McGovern Medical School at Houston, Texas Medical Center; adan.rios@uth.tmc.edu Q: Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) remains a scourge with a typically rapid fatal course resistant to most therapy. All solid tumors must receive sufficient blood supply to grow. Plerixafor is an FDA-approved drug that may inhibit… Read more »

  •   Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Excerpt:

    “Hypofractionated external beam radiation therapy (EBRT) for early prostate cancer represents a reasonable alternative to standard treatment protocols involving lower doses of radiation administered over a longer period of time, according to a new clinical guideline.

    ” ‘Moderately hypofractionated’ EBRT regimens result in similar disease control and side effects as compared with conventional protocols, although the shortened regimens confer a small risk of more short-term gastrointestinal toxicity. Additionally, physicians should counsel patients about the limited data on oncologic outcomes beyond 5 years of follow-up, according to a panel representing the American Society for Radiation Oncology, American Society of Clinical Oncology, and American Urological Association.”

    Go to full article published by MedPage Today on Oct 11, 2018.

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  •   Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Excerpt:

    Individuals with an inherited form of skin cancer often have a poor prognosis. The type of immunotherapy that was awarded this year’s Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine is, however, particularly effective in this patient group, research from Karolinska Institutet in Sweden shows. The study is published in the Journal of Medical Genetics.

    “Congenital mutations of the CDKN2A gene are the strongest known risk factors for inherited . Individuals with  who carry mutations in this gene also have , according to previous research.”

    Go to full article published by Medical Xpress on Oct 8, 2018.

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  •   Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Excerpt from Healio:

    “The FDA approved dacomitinib for the first-line treatment of patients with metastatic non-small cell lung cancer whose tumors have EGFR exon 19 deletion or exon 21 L858R substitution mutations.

    “Dacomitinib (Vizimpro, Pfizer) is a once-daily oral pan-human EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitor.”

    Go to full article published by Healio on Sep 28, 2018.

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  •   Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Excerpt from Cancer Network:

    “Adding to a growing list of similar results, the Short-HER study was unable to show noninferiority of 9 weeks of trastuzumab compared with the standard 1 year when given along with chemotherapy in women with HER2-positive breast cancer. Shorter administration does, however, reduce the risk of cardiotoxicity.

    ” ‘Adjuvant pivotal trials with 1-year trastuzumab have significantly improved the prognosis of HER2-positive early breast cancer,’ wrote study authors led by Pierfranco Conte, MD, of the Istituto Oncologico Veneto in Italy. Several studies have attempted to reduce the duration of trastuzumab, though most have failed to show noninferiority.”

    Go to full article published by Cancer Network on Oct 1, 2018.

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  •  

    TLR and STING Agonists: A New Venture in Cancer Immunotherapy

    Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Immunotherapy includes a number of strategies that harness the immune system to help treat disease. Immunotherapy for cancer, as we know it, now relies on the activation of specific immune system cells known as T cells. Cancer drugs called immune checkpoint inhibitors act by removing the brakes imposed on T cells by tumors or by the body’s natural mechanisms for limiting their activation to… Read more »

  •   Emma Shtivelman, PhD

    Excerpt from Healio:

    “LOXO-292 appeared well tolerated and demonstrated antitumor activity among patients with heavily pretreated RET fusion-positive non-small cell lung cancer, according to updated interim results of a global, phase 1/phase 2 trial presented at International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer’s World Conference on Lung Cancer.

    “Researchers reported initial clinical data from the LIBRETTO-001 dose escalation/expansion study of LOXO-292 (Loxo Oncology) — an oral and selective agent in clinical development for cancers that harbor abnormalities in the rearranged during transfection (RET) kinase — at ASCO Annual Meeting in June.”

    Go to full article published by Healio on Sep 27, 2018.

    If you’re wondering whether this story applies to your own cancer case or a loved one’s, we invite you to get support from Cancer Commons.