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 Journal of Clinical Oncology presents a Rapid Communications summary of the PENELOPE-B trial, a double-blind, placebo‐controlled, phase III study in women with HR+, HER2- primary breast cancer without a pathological complete response after taxane‐containing NACT and at high risk of relapse. With about one-third of women relapsing, palbociclib – a cyclin-dependent kinase 4 and 6 inhibitor – was examined.

This podcast/article on KevinMD.com by Syad Nishat, a partner at the Wall Street Alliance Group, offers tips and advice for the physician on estate planning, which is one of the most neglected aspects of financial planning. However, its complexity and unpredictability shouldn’t stop you from talking to a financial advisor to best prepare yourself and your family for the unexpected.

A diagnosis that is made after all differential diagnoses have been ruled out – a diagnosis of exclusion (DOE) – is a challenge for the physician. Despite the DOE being verifiable, the diagnostic tests needed simply cannot be performed – think brain biopsy – or are too difficult to perform. These five diseases are notoriously tricky to diagnose and will test your documentation skills, as well as your attention to detail.

In this Original Report from the Journal of Clinical Oncology, the authors hypothesized that hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT) with a mismatched unrelated donor (MMUD) using post-transplant cyclophosphamide (PTCy), a novel strategy successful in overcoming genetic disparity using mismatched related donors, would be feasible and increase access to HCT. Was their hypothesis correct?

From the pages of Clinical Advances in Hematology & Oncology comes this review of selected presentations from the 2021 TCT Meetings Digital Experience, which took place February 8-12, 2021. Expert commentary is provided by Dr. Yi-Bin Chen, Director of the Hematopoietic Cell Transplant & Cellular Therapy Program at Massachusetts General Hospital.