May 19, 2016
September 2013, Vol 2, No 6
Illustrating the New Era of Personalized Medicine
Dear Colleague, It gives us great pleasure to present this issue of Personalized Medicine in Oncology (PMO). Over the past several months, we have thoroughly examined every aspect of the journal – appearance, readability, and most importantly, editorial content. You will see the result of our efforts in the following [ Read More ]
Letter to Our ReadersHow Do Melanoma Experts Use the New Agents?
Melanoma experts gathered at the second annual World Cutaneous Malignancies Congress to debate the optimal means of treating melanoma using the new agents and to share predictions about the future treatment landscape in metastatic melanoma. Their insights are shared in this report. Metastatic Melanoma: Which Drug First? Despite excitement over [ Read More ]
ImmunotherapyUtilizing a Personalized Diagnostic in a Class of Hodgkin Lymphoma Patients:
An Interview With Lawrence M. Weiss, MD, of Clarient Diagnostic Services, Inc.
Lawrence M. Weiss, MD, is Medical Director of Clarient Diagnostic Services. He is Chairman Emeritus of the Department of Pathology at the City of Hope National Medical Center. He received his BS summa cum laude and his MD summa cum laude from the University of Maryland. He completed a residency [ Read More ]
Interview with the InnovatorsGenomic Sequencing Assay Potentially a Game Changer
Hollywood, FL – Genomic profiling of individual tumors represents a paradigm shift in oncology and holds great promise for patients, according to Gary Palmer, MD, JD, MBA, MPH, Senior Vice President, Medical Affairs and Commercial Development, Foundation Medicine, who described this new genomic assay at the Third Annual Conference of [ Read More ]
UncategorizedPathways Creating More and More Value
Hollywood, FL – Pathways continue to be refined toward value-based care, adapting to the challenges of a rapidly shifting oncology landscape, as 2 speakers at the Third Annual Conference of the Association for Value-Based Cancer Care described. Michael A. Kolodziej, MD, National Medical Director for Oncology Strategies at Aetna, Hartford, [ Read More ]
UncategorizedGenetic Susceptibility to Renal Cell Carcinoma
In 2013, approximately 65,000 people will be diagnosed with kidney cancer and two-thirds will be men.1 The term kidney cancer generally refers to any cancer arising in the kidney or renal pelvis. However, this article will focus on the most common type of kidney cancer seen in adults, renal cell [ Read More ]
UncategorizedPonatinib Given Early May Stem Resistance in CML
Mutation analysis at baseline and at the end of treatment (EOT) provides information about the response to ponatinib in patients with chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) and Philadelphia chromosome–positive (Ph+) acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL) enrolled in the phase 2 PACE study. Results were presented at the 2013 Annual Meeting of ASCO. [ Read More ]
UncategorizedOlaparib Maintenance Therapy Slows Progression in Patients With Ovarian Cancer and BRCA Mutations
Olaparib maintenance therapy prolonged progression-free survival (PFS) and the time to disease progression after a second subsequent therapy (PFS2) in patients with platinum-sensitive relapsed serous ovarian cancer (SOC). The effect of olaparib was particularly robust in patients with a BRCA mutation in an updated analysis of Study 19 presented at [ Read More ]
UncategorizedBevacizumab Maintenance Improves Survival in mCRC, but Added Erlotinib Is of No Value
Bevacizumab maintenance therapy following induction with bevacizumab-based chemotherapy significantly increases progression-free survival (PFS) in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC). However, the addition of erlotinib in the maintenance phase does not increase overall survival (OS) compared with bevacizumab alone. KRAS status was not a predictor of benefit from erlotinib in [ Read More ]
UncategorizedGenomic Sequencing Uncovers the Genetic Landscape of Primary CNS Lymphoma: Will likely lead to new targeted therapies for an incurable malignancy
Lugano, Switzerland – The genomic basis of primary central nervous system lymphoma (PCNSL), a very aggressive and incurable type of lymphoma, has not been understood until now. At the 2013 International Conference on Malignant Lymphoma, a team of researchers from the Mayo Clinic and from the University of Virginia presented [ Read More ]
UncategorizedTo PARP or Not to PARP – What Is the Question? Perspective on the First “Disappointment” With a New Drug Class
The proposition appeared simple – as it turns out, deceptively so. The oncology community was a bit disheartened when the much anticipated results of a phase 3 trial by Dr Joyce O’Shaughnessy did not replicate the success of her phase 2 study1 in which the PARP inhibitor iniparib was used [ Read More ]
The Last Word