Catch up with what you missed as we count down the 10 most-read stories on OncologyReport.com last year.
10. Everolimus Posts Big Win in ER-Positive Breast Cancer By Patrice Wendling
This first report of the BOLERO-2 trial -- a potential practice changer -- came out of the European Multidisciplinary Cancer Congress in Stockholm.
Courtesy flickr user woodleywonderworks (Creative Commons)
9. Multimodal DCIS Therapy, Tamoxifen Cuts Breast Cancer Deaths By Neil Osterweil
A meta-analysis from Australia found that adding radiotherapy and tamoxifen to breast-conserving surgery significantly reduces the local recurrence rate and the breast cancer–specific death rate in women with ductal carcinoma in situ. It was presented at the American Society of Radiation Oncology (ASTRO) meeitng in Miami Beach.
8. Crizotinib Approval Personalizes Lung Cancer Therapy By Miriam E. Tucker
The swift approval of crizotinib capsules by the Food and Drug Administration as the first and only targeted therapy for locally advanced or metastatic ALK-positive non–small cell lung cancer represented another milestone in biomarker-driven, personalized medicine. Crizotinib was approved, along with a companion diagnostic test, Abbott Molecular’s Vysis ALK Break Apart FISH Probe Kit, which identifies the anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK) fusion gene that the drug targets.
7. Clinicians Slow to Embrace Sipuleucel-T for Prostate Cancer By Diana Mahoney
Most physicians have strong opinions on sipuleucel-T, including dubbing its approval "a milestone in the history of oncology," but many of them refused to speak about it on the record. Our persistent reporter found the reasons for their reluctance to use the first cancer vaccine went beyond reimbursement issues belabored in the financial press.
6. Drug Shortages Increasingly Take Toll on Care By Elizabeth Mechcatie
With their increasing prevalence, drug shortages in the United States have led to delays in treatment, forced the use of less effective alternatives, and encouraged a burgeoning gray market that sells tough-to-obtain medications at highly inflated prices, according to stakeholders gathered at a recent Food and Drug Administration meeting.
5. Practice Changers Expected at San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium By Jane Salodof MacNeil
The 2011 San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium featured a hefty number of studies that could change clinical practice. One of the most exciting SABCS meetings in recent years, it featured the phase III BOLERO-2 and CLEOPATRA trials, a new Oncotype DX assay for ductal carcinoma in situ, reports from four bisphosphonate trials, and a controversial brachytherapy study.
4. FDA Approves Brentuximab for Two Lymphomas By Elizabeth Mechcatie
The Food and Drug Administration on Aug. 19 gave an accelerated approval to brentuximab, a CD30-directed antibody drug-conjugate, for the treatment of Hodgkin’s lymphoma and systemic anaplastic large-cell lymphoma, after other treatments have failed.
3. FDA Approves Vemurafenib for Advanced Melanoma By Jane Salodof MacNeil
The Food and Drug Administration announced on August 17 the approval of vemurafenib, a highly anticipated metastatic melanoma therapy that targets the BRAF V600E mutation found in 40%-60% of patients. It also approved the cobas 4800 BRAF V600 Mutation Test, a companion diagnostic test designed to help determine whether a patient’s melanoma cells carry the BRAF V600E mutation.
2. Novel Therapies Put Multiple Myeloma 'On the Ropes' By Susan London
A sweep of new agents are poised to deliver what could be a knock-out blow to multiple myeloma, according to the director of the myeloma program at the University of California, San Francisco. Some are second- or third-generation agents in a mainstay class that appear to have less toxicity than and/or overcome resistance to their predecessors, Dr. Jeffrey L. Wolf said at the annual Oncology Congress in San Francisco. Others come from classes not previously used in this disease.
1. NICE Rejects Ipilimumab by Jennie Smith
A drug considered a breakthrough treatment for advanced melanoma was turned down by England’s clinical and cost-effectiveness agency. The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence, which makes recommendations to the National Health Service in England and Wales, said that it was not likely to recommend ipilimumab (Bristol-Myers Squibb’s Yervoy). The agency cited cost concerns and what it called insufficient follow-up results from a manufacturer-sponsored, phase III, randomized, placebo-controlled trial of ipilimumab.
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