Treatment - Cancer Currents Blog
Cancer treatment related news, with context from leading experts. Includes articles on new therapies, treatment side effects, and important trends in treatment-related research.
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The immunotherapy drug durvalumab (Imfinzi) can help people with early-stage small cell lung cancer live longer, results from a large clinical trial show. Three years after starting treatment, nearly 60% of people who received the drug were still alive.
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When it comes to cancer drugs, researchers are moving away from a paradigm called the maximum tolerated dose. Instead, they’re focusing more on identifying doses that produce fewer side effects but are still effective against a person’s cancer.
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FDA has granted an accelerated approval to tovorafenib (Ojemda) for kids and teens who have low-grade glioma with changes in the BRAF gene. In a small clinical trial, the drug shrank or completely eliminated tumors in nearly 70% of patients.
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In a large clinical trial, treatment with pembrolizumab after surgery helped people with kidney cancer live longer than those who got a placebo and standard monitoring. The findings mark the first time an adjuvant treatment for kidney cancer has improved survival.
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FDA has approved alectinib (Alecensa) as adjuvant therapy for people with lung cancer who have ALK-positive tumors. In a clinical trial, alectinib helped people live longer after surgery without their cancer returning than chemotherapy.
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Trastuzumab deruxtecan (Enhertu) can now be used to treat any advanced solid cancer that produces high levels of the protein HER2 (HER2-positive tumors). FDA’s accelerated approval was based on findings from three clinical trials.
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FDA approved mirvetuximab soravtansine-gynx (Elahere) to treat people with advanced, platinum-resistant ovarian cancer whose tumors overproduce a protein called FR-α. The full approval was based on the results of a large, randomized trial called MIRASOL, which showed Elahere improved survival for these people.
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Adding rusfertide to treatment for polycythemia vera cut phlebotomy rates from nine to less than one per year in a recent clinical trial. The finding may improve the quality of life for those who manage the blood cancer with frequent blood draws.
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For some people with early-stage cervical cancer, a surgical procedure called a simple hysterectomy may be a safe and effective alternative to treatment with a radical hysterectomy, results from the SHAPE trial show.
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In a clinical trial, an injectable form of nivolumab (Opdivo) was as effective against kidney cancer as the intravenous form of the drug. Side effects were also similar and treatment time was shorter. Injectable immunotherapies, several experts said, if found to be comparable to IV forms, can be more convenient to receive and accessible to more people.
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In an event more than three decades in the making, FDA has approved lifileucel (Amtagvi), the first cancer treatment that uses immune cells called tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes, or TILs.
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Results from a new study suggest that the presence of circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) in blood samples can predict which patients with colorectal cancer should and shouldn’t get chemotherapy after surgery to remove their tumors.
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The results of the clinical trial that led to FDA’s 2023 approval of repotrectinib (Augtyro) for lung cancers with ROS1 fusions have been published. The drug shrank tumors in 80% of people receiving the drug as an initial treatment.
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Training provided by NCI scientists helped researchers in India design an effective CAR-T cell therapy, NexCAR19, that can be manufactured in India, made available at a reasonable cost, and meet the needs of patients in India’s health care system.
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Some people with no evidence of cancer in nearby lymph nodes after presurgical chemotherapy can skip radiation to that area without increasing the risk of the cancer returning, a clinical trial found. But some experts caution that more details are needed.
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Adding daratumumab (Darzalex) to standard treatment helped people with newly diagnosed multiple myeloma live longer without their cancer getting worse or dying. People taking daratumumab were also more likely to have no detectable signs of cancer (minimal residual disease) after treatment.
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Under a new FDA approval, enzalutamide (Xtandi) can now be used alone, or in combination with leuprolide, to treat people with nonmetastatic prostate cancer that is at high risk of returning after surgery or radiation.
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FDA approved toripalimab (Loqtorzi) based on the results of a large clinical trial showing that, when added to chemotherapy, the drug extended survival in people with nasopharyngeal cancer that returned after initial treatment or spread in the body.
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Tarlatamab, a new type of targeted immunotherapy, shrank small cell lung cancer (SCLC) tumors in more than 30% of participants in an early-stage clinical trial. Participants had SCLC that had progressed after previous treatments with other drugs.
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For the first time in decades, people with advanced bladder cancer have more effective treatment options. New clinical trial results mark a pivotal moment following years of little progress, bladder cancer experts believe.