In May 2018, President Trump announced his plan to lower drug prices. “We will have tougher negotiation, more competition, and much lower prices at the pharmacy counter. And it will start to take effect very soon,” he promised. The plan is outlined in a 40-page document by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services titled “American Patients First—The Trump Administration Blueprint to Lower Drug Prices and Reduce Out-of-Pocket Cost.” (1)
President Donald Trump May 30 signed the “Right to Try” bill into law, making it possible for terminally ill patients to bypass FDA to gain access to experimental drugs.
The FDA has approved Doptelet (avatrombopag) for thrombocytopenia in adults with chronic liver disease scheduled to undergo a procedure.
Foundation Medicine Inc. and Merck announced a collaboration to develop companion diagnostic tests for use with Keytruda (pembrolizumab), Merck's anti-PD-1 therapy and the first approved immunotherapy for microsatellite instability high or mismatch repair deficient solid tumors.
Breast cancer survivors are not getting the recommended level of screening, post-surgery, according to a study in JNCCN – Journal of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network.
MimiVax LLC announced positive interim results from a multicenter phase II study of SurVaxM in patients with newly diagnosed glioblastoma.
A national retrospective study led by researchers at MD Anderson Cancer Center found no association between intensity of post-treatment surveillance and detection of recurrence or overall survival in patients with stage I, II or III colorectal cancer. Published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the study is the largest of surveillance intensity in CRC ever conducted.
Finasteride, a common hormone-blocking drug, reduces men's risk of getting prostate cancer without increasing their risk of dying from the disease, according to long-term follow-up data.
The FY18 Defense Appropriations Act provides $100 million to the Department of Defense Prostate Cancer Research Program to support innovative, high-impact prostate cancer research.
Dan Theodorescu was named director of the Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Institute at Cedars-Sinai.
