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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Trametinib Is a New Treatment Option for Rare Form of Ovarian CancerNew results from a large study show that trametinib (Mekinist) is an effective treatment for low-grade serous ovarian cancer. The findings are the first strong evidence that this rare type of ovarian cancer should be treated differently from other forms of the disease.
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Telehealth-Based Cancer Care Surged during COVID. Will It Continue?Experts say studies are needed on how to best transition telehealth from a temporary solution during the pandemic to a permanent part of cancer care that’s accessible to all who need it.
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Experimental Medulloblastoma Treatment Gets a Boost with NanoparticlesA nanoparticle coating may help cancer drugs reach medulloblastoma tumors in the brain and make the treatment less toxic. Mice treated with nanoparticles containing palbociclib (Ibrance) and sapanisertib lived substantially longer than those treated with either drug alone.
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Can Chronic Graft-Versus-Host Disease Be Prevented?Removing immune cells called naive T cells from donated stem cells before they are transplanted may prevent chronic graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) in people with leukemia, a new study reports. The procedure did not appear to increase the likelihood of patients’ cancer returning.
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Durvalumab Modestly Improves Survival in Advanced Biliary Tract CancerAdding durvalumab (Imfinzi) to standard chemotherapy modestly extended how long people with advanced biliary tract cancer lived, results from the TOPAZ-1 trial show. The immunotherapy drug may now be the standard first-line therapy for this hard-to-treat cancer.
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Cancer Immunotherapies Don’t Work for Everyone: HLA Gene May Explain WhyA specific form of the HLA gene, HLA-A*03, may make immune checkpoint inhibitors less effective for some people with cancer, according to an NCI-led study. If additional studies confirm the finding, it could help guide the use of these commonly used drugs.
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Can mRNA Vaccines Help Treat Cancer?The success of mRNA vaccines for COVID-19 could help accelerate research on using mRNA vaccine technology to treat cancer, including the development of personalized cancer vaccines.
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Should CAR T Cells Be Used Earlier in People with Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma?Results from three clinical trials have found that CAR T cells may be superior to standard treatments for patients with B-cell NHL that has not responded to treatment (refractory) or has returned after treatment (relapsed).
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When Ovarian Cancer Returns, Surgery May Be a Good Choice for Selected PatientsFor patients with recurrent ovarian cancer who meet strict criteria, additional surgery may improve survival, results from a large clinical trial show.
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Immunotherapy Combination Most Effective as Initial Treatment for BRAF+ MelanomaClinical trial finds that ipilimumab (Yervoy) and nivolumab (Opdivo) combo is superior to a combination of the targeted therapies dabrafenib (Tafinlar) and trametinib (Mekinist) as the first treatment for metastatic BRAF-positive melanoma.
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Shorter, More Intensive Radiation Safe after Surgery for Prostate CancerMany with prostate cancer can safely receive shorter, higher-dose radiation therapy after surgery, a new study has found. The approach, called HYPORT, didn’t harm patients’ quality of life compared with the standard radiation approach, trial finds.
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Tecartus Becomes First CAR T-Cell Therapy Approved for Adults with ALLThe CAR T-cell therapy Tecartus has become the first such treatment approved by FDA to treat adults with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). The approval is for patients whose cancer has not responded to treatment or returned after treatment.
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Enhertu May Be Preferred Therapy for Some Metastatic Breast CancersIn people with metastatic HER2-positive breast cancer, the targeted drug trastuzumab deruxtecan (Enhertu) markedly lengthened progression-free survival compared with trastuzumab emtansine (Kadcycla), new study results show.
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Pembrolizumab May Help Prevent Early-Stage Melanoma from ReturningTrial results show patients who received the immunotherapy pembrolizumab (Keytruda) after surgery to remove high-risk stage II melanomas were less likely to have the cancer come back than those who received no treatment after surgery.
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Combo of Ribociclib, Letrozole Improves Survival in Advanced Breast CancerIn a large clinical trial, women with HR-positive, HER2-negative metastatic breast cancer treated with ribociclib (Kisqali) and letrozole (Femara) as their initial treatment lived approximately 1 year longer than women treated with letrozole only.
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Breast Cancer Surgery Choice May Affect Young Survivors’ Quality of LifeWomen with early-stage breast cancer who had one or both breasts surgically removed (a unilateral or bilateral mastectomy) had lower scores on a quality-of-life survey than women who had breast-conserving surgery, a new study has found.
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FDA Approval of Rylaze Will Address Drug Shortage for Childhood ALLFDA has approved a new form of asparaginase called Rylaze. The drug was developed to help alleviate shortages of Erwinia asparaginase, a key part of treatment for children and adults with acute lymphoblastic leukemia.
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For Kids with Medulloblastoma, Trial Suggests Radiation Can Be TailoredStandard radiation for medulloblastoma can cause long-term damage to a child’s developing brain. A new clinical trial suggests that the volume and dose of radiation could be safely tailored based on genetic features in the patient’s tumor.
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For Advanced Prostate Cancer, Radiopharmaceutical Improves SurvivalA drug called Lu177-PSMA-617 may be a new option for treating advanced prostate cancer. In a large clinical trial, adding the drug—a type of radiopharmaceutical—to standard treatments improved how long participants lived.
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FDA Approval of KRAS Inhibitor Sotorasib for Lung Cancer Hailed as MilestoneFDA has approved the first KRAS-blocking drug, sotorasib (Lumakras). The approval, which covers the use of sotorasib to treat some patients with advanced lung cancer, sets the stage for other KRAS inhibitors already in development, researchers said.