The FDA Oncologic Drugs Advisory Committee July 11 voted to approve Pfizer's Mylotarg (gemtuzumab ozogamicin, GO), a CD33-directed antibody-drug conjugate for the indication of “combination therapy with daunorubicin and cytarabine for the treatment of adult patients with previously untreated, de novo CD33-positive acute myeloid leukemia.
The House Subcommittee on Appropriations for Labor-HHS marked up the fiscal 2018 spending bill—voting 9-6 along party lines on legislation that would prohibit the use of any new discretionary funding in connection with the Affordable Care Act.
Steven Piantadosi has stepped down from his position as director of Cedars-Sinai Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Institute.
Immunotherapy researcher and oncologist Edus Warren was named head of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center program in Global Oncology. The program is focused on transforming cancer care in sub-Saharan Africa, China and other regions by providing greater access to the latest research and treatment. Warren, who goes by the nickname, “Hootie,” has been at Fred Hutch for 24 years. He designed and led Fred Hutch's first clinical trial on T-cell therapy for patients with leukemia. More recently, he has concentrated on global oncology, and today about half of the research in his lab is focused on cancers that are particularly prevalent in Uganda, where Fred Hutch has a long-standing collaboration with the Uganda Cancer Institute, or UCI. As program head, Warren will lead the research program with UCI, which was initiated because of the high incidence of infection-associated cancers in the region, and now encompasses Kaposi sarcoma, Burkitt and other non-Hodgkin lymphomas, cervical cancer, breast cancer and Hodgkin lymphomas. He will also spearhead collaborations between Fred Hutch and Chinese medical researchers that go back decades. Today, Fred Hutch's China Initiative focuses on infection-associated cancers, environmental exposures, immunotherapy and cancer biomarkers for precision medicine. “The opportunities to grow these and other international partnerships, while bringing the full breadth of Fred Hutch's expertise and ingenuity to bear, make this an exciting time for Global Oncology at Fred Hutch,” said Gary Gilliland, Fred Hutch's director and president. “Under Hootie's leadership, Global Oncology will work to engage oncologists, infectious disease doctors, epidemiologists and other researchers from Seattle, Uganda and elsewhere in unique research and training opportunities aimed at improving patient outcomes in the near-term and amplifying our impact globally in years to come.” Most academic institutions and nongovernment organizations working in sub-Saharan Africa concentrate on infectious diseases such as HIV, tuberculosis and malaria. Fred Hutch's program is dedicated to ending the suffering caused by cancer in these regions. More than 70 percent of cancer deaths worldwide occur in low- and middle-income countries. The Fred Hutch program grew out of a small 2004 research project with UCI, which led to a formal alliance in 2008. In 2015, the state-of-the-art UCI-Fred Hutch Cancer Research Centre opened in Kampala to house research, training, laboratories and adult and pediatric outpatient clinical care.
Perlmutter Cancer Center at NYU Langone announced the creation of a multidisciplinary center to develop approaches to diagnose, treat and prevent pancreatic cancer.
The Pain & Palliative Care Program at Fox Chase Cancer Center is offering a new Hospice and Palliative Medicine fellowship in partnership with the Hospice of the Visiting Nurse Association of Greater Philadelphia and Temple University Hospital.
FDA has approved the supplemental Biologics License Application for Blincyto (blinatumomab) to include overall survival data from the phase III TOWER study.
Merck said FDA has placed a clinical hold on Keynote-183, Keynote-185 and Keynote-023, three combination studies of Keytruda (pembrolizumab), the company's anti-PD-1 therapy, in the blood cancer multiple myeloma.
FDA approved the supplemental Biologics License Application for Vectibix (panitumumab) for patients with wild-type RAS (defined as wild-type in both KRAS and NRAS as determined by an FDA-approved test for this use) metastatic colorectal cancer as first-line therapy in combination with FOLFOX and as monotherapy following disease progression after prior treatment with fluoropyrimidine, oxaliplatin, and irinotecan-containing chemotherapy.
A single chemotherapy treatment can result in a significant negative impact on walking gait and balance, putting patients at an increasing risk for falls, according to a new study involving breast cancer patients conducted by researchers at Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute.
