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Top Medical News
Serum level of circulating 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] near time of diagnosis of oesophageal adenocarcinoma is not associated with overall survival (OS), a study has found.
While stereotactic body radiotherapy (SBRT) improves quality of life (QoL) in men with localized prostate cancer, it may lead to worse sexual function and urinary incontinence, a recent study has shown.
Smokers are at increased risk of developing pancreatic cancer, but quitting seems to exert a protective benefit with potential sex differences, according to a study.
Individuals with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2D) may be at risk of developing gastric cancer even after receiving Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) eradication therapy, demonstrated a study from Hong Kong.
Aberrations of tumour protein p53 in radical prostatectomy tissue are associated with clinically relevant endpoints of metastatic relapse and prostate cancer specific mortality (PCSM), suggests a recent study.
Pregnancy attenuates the risk of endometrial cancer regardless of whether it ends shortly after conception or at 40 weeks of gestation, a study has shown. A biological process occurring within the first weeks of pregnancy drives this risk reduction, as shown by pregnancies terminated through induced abortions having similar risk reductions as those ending in childbirth.
A recent study involving 99 patients in Hong Kong demonstrated that arsenic trioxide (As2O3), used as part of induction and maintenance treatment for newly diagnosed acute promyelocytic leukaemia (APL), is safe and highly effective, achieving 100 percent complete response (CR), 3-year leukaemia-free survival (LFS) and 3-year overall survival (OS) rates.
Special Reports
Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) is the most common primary tumour arising from the kidney, constituting approximately 80–85% of primary renal neoplasms. According to the Malaysian National Cancer Registry Report 2007–2011, RCC accounts for 62.8% of all kidney cancers nationwide. RCC typically occurs approximately 50% more commonly in men compared with women, and predominantly occurs in the sixth to eighth decade of life.
In March 2018, sublingual fentanyl citrate (SLF; Abstral®, Menarini) was made available in Malaysia. SLF is a rapid-onset opioid (ROO) indicated for the management of breakthrough cancer pain (BTcP) episodes in patients that are opioid-tolerant. In July 2018, Menarini organized an expert meeting, aptly named Malaysian Collaborative Meeting of Pain Specialists to Improve Oncology Management (MY-COMPASSION), comprising of key figures in anaesthesiology, palliative care and oncology to discuss current insights into local BTcP management. Below are highlights from the meeting.
Comprehensive genomic profiling (CGP) has emerged as a key driving force behind personalized cancer care. With the wealth of data available with CGP, medical oncologists now have in their armamentarium a tool that could enable them to provide patients with the optimum treatment. At a Roche Foundation Medicine-sponsored symposium held at the 2018 European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO) Congress in Munich, Germany, a panel of experts reviewed key data on CGP, with a focus on the treatment of advanced cancers.
Recently, a Roche-sponsored dinner symposium was held in conjunction with the launch of atezolizumab (Tecentriq®, Roche) at Royale Chulan, Kuala Lumpur. Important insights into the evolving treatment landscape of anticancer treatment, and the increasingly prominent role of immunotherapy were gathered from a distinguished panel, including Dato’ Dr Mohamed Ibrahim, Professor Dr Rolf A. Stahel, Dr Voon Pei Jye, and Associate Professor Dr Tho Lye Mun. Here are the highlights of the meeting.
In advanced-stage, newly diagnosed classical, CD30-positive Hodgkin lymphoma (HL), front-line therapy has resulted in durable remission rates in up to 70–90% of patients, although approximately 25–30% of advanced stage HL patients are refractory or relapse following first-line treatment with ABVD (adriamycin, bleomycin, vinblastine, dacarbazine) chemotherapy.1–3 The standard of care for patients with relapsed or refractory (r/r) classical HL is salvage therapy using second-line high-dose chemotherapy (HDCT), followed by autologous haematopoietic stem cell transplant (ASCT) in eligible patients, which can induce a complete remission (CR) in about 50% of patients.4 Nevertheless, the prognosis of patients who relapse after the salvage HDCT/ASCT is exceedingly poor, with a median survival duration of approximately 1.2 years.5
At a recent dinner symposium held during the Abstral® Grand Launch at Le Meridien Putrajaya, Dr Michael Überall spoke on the management of breakthrough cancer pain (BTcP) and highlighted the role of sublingual fentanyl ([SLF], Abstral®; A. Menarini Pte Ltd) in the optimization of BTcP in cancer patients.
At the recent American Society of Haematology Annual Meeting 2017, Professor François-Xavier Mahon reviewed recent studies related to tyrosine kinase inhibitor (TKI) cessation in patients with chronic myeloid leukaemia (CML) who have achieved sustained deep molecular response (DMR).
Conference Reports
Reduced conditioning
intensity is significantly associated with increased relapse, decreased
disease-free survival (DFS), and decreased overall survival (OS) in acute
myeloid leukaemia (AML) patients with measurable residual disease (MRD), a new
analysis of a phase III randomized clinical trial has shown.
The combination of TAS-118 and oxaliplatin led to significantly greater survival compared with the S-1 and cisplatin combination in patients with metastatic or recurrent HER2-negative gastric cancer, the phase III SOLAR* study showed.
Reducing the dose of regorafenib did little to affect the overall tolerability of the drug in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC), according to the phase II REARRANGE* trial presented at ESMO GI 2019.
The survival benefit with ramucirumab was consistent in patients with advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and high alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) levels regardless of whether they were previously treated with transarterial chemoembolization (TACE), a post hoc analysis of pooled data from the REACH/REACH-2 studies shows.
Augmenting the triple chemotherapeutic regimen FOLFOXIRI* with bevacizumab demonstrated favourable efficacy regardless of age and gender in patients with unresectable metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC), according to data presented at the ESMO World Congress on Gastrointestinal Cancer (ESMO GI) 2019.
Adding bevacizumab to trifluridine/tipiracil (FTD/TPI) significantly improves progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) compared with FTD/TPI in patients with chemorefractory metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC), according to a study presented at ESMO GI 2019.
A first-in-class immunoglobulin G4 (IgG4) antibody targeting CD47 has demonstrated durable responses when used in combination with rituximab in patients with relapsed/refractory (R/R) diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) or indolent lymphoma.
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