Articles related to CHEMOTHERAPY

In this JAMA Original Investigation, the researchers studied 19,529 patients with Medicare coverage who initiated first systemic therapy for advanced non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) using 1 of 4 regimens of checkpoint inhibitor immunotherapy, cytotoxic chemotherapy, and combined chemoimmunotherapy. The goal? To gauge the uptake and effectiveness of immunotherapy among older patients outside clinical trials.

As a TROP-2-directed antibody-drug conjugate with an SN-38 payload that has shown preliminary activity in metastatic urothelial carcinoma (mUC), sacituzumab govitecan (SG) – brand name Trodelvy –was evaluated and compared to current treatments to gauge whether SG objective response rates (ORRs) and median overall survival (OS) outperform the average of 10% ORR and 7 to 8 months OS.  

Published recently in Blood, the University of Guelph study highlights a compound only found in avocados – avocatin B – that inhibits the enzyme VLCAD, which is highly prevalent in acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Because the cancer cells rely on this pathway to survive, scientists are hoping to hold human clinical trials to gauge whether avocatin B can be used as a safer, less toxic treatment than traditional chemotherapy.

The third case in a three-part series, this article chronicles the treatment journey of a 50-year-old male patient who had been diagnosed with left-sided colon cancer in January 2016. After multiple FOLFOX doses, FOLFIRI cycles, and resection, the patient began treatment with regorafenib in July 2020 as a third-line treatment, with the hope that this agent could potentially re-sensitize the tumor to subsequent anti–epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) therapy.

From the pages of Blood Advances comes this Clinical Trials & Observations piece discussing the IDEAL trial. Backed by visual abstracts, tables, and charts supporting the data, the article explores two key points in augmenting chemotherapy efficacy: caloric restriction and using insulin and adiponectin as potential biomarkers of B-ALL chemosensitivity.

Although the MYSTIC phase 3 clinical trial examining durvalumab therapy for non–small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC) did not meet its primary end points – overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) – it did show a numerically reduced risk for death with durvalumab (Imfinzi) versus chemotherapy in patients with PD-L1 expression on ≥25% of tumor cells.