Past Issues – Page 2 – The Cancer Letter

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Issue 25 - Jun. 21, 2019

TCL45-25 (248 downloads)

Real World Evidence
How a Flatiron hackathon team linked Medicaid expansion with reduction in racial disparities in time to cancer treatment
Last December, Flatiron Health convened a “hackathon,” an event where programmers, developers, and scientists pitch novel ideas and aggressively crunch data in a competitive sprint.
Conversation with The Cancer Letter
Flatiron’s Adamson: Medicaid disparities study shows real world data is valuable for assessing policy
Before 2019, Blythe Adamson, a senior quantitative scientist at Flatiron Health, had never attended an annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology.
House bill gives NIH a $2B increase, but battle over budget caps looms
The House of Representatives June 19 passed a package of four appropriations bills for fiscal year 2020.
Review
Chernobyl, the HBO miniseries: Fact and fiction (Part IV)
Readers will be pleased to learn this is the final installment of my reviews of the HBO Chernobyl miniseries, which just ended its TV run June 3. The series, which has received extraordinary critical acclaim, had a vast global audience.
NCI advisors approve 23 concepts at joint NCAB/BSA meeting
The NCI Board of Scientific Advisors has approved 23 new and reissue concepts: five Requests for Applications/Requests For Proposals and 18 PARs, program announcements reviewed in the institute.
In Brief
- Cathy Eng named co-leader of GI cancer program at Vanderbilt
- Mark Bonnen named chair of radiation oncology at UT Health San Antonio
- Steven Shak to receive Leadership in Personalized Medicine Award
- Upal Basu Roy named vice president of research at LUNGevity
- Thomas J. Smith awarded ASCO/Walther Cancer Foundation palliative and supportive care award
- ASCO announces Health Policy Leadership Development Program fellows
- Stephanie Dutton receives Susan G. Komen Greater Pennsylvania award
- Northwell opens Pancreatic Cancer Center
Trials & Tribulations
Lessons from the front lines of value-based care: The OCM’s impact on community oncology
Nearly three years after its introduction, the CMS’s Oncology Care Model (OCM) remains the most ambitious and far-reaching initiative to shift cancer care toward value-based models.
Clinical Roundup
- Study finds one in six cancer survivors reported pain restricting daily functioning
- Radiation + chemo doesn’t improve endometrial cancer recurrence-free survival
- Mount Sinai researchers show first link between exposure to dust from 9/11 attack and prostate cancer
Drugs & Targets
- FDA approves pembrolizumab for metastatic SCLC
- FDA approves Amgen and Allergan’s Kanjinti, Herceptin biosimilar
- Lynparza approved in EU for ovarian cancer
- Lynparza approved in Japan for ovarian cancer
- Myriad receives second insurance reimbursement decision for its BRACAnalysis in Japan
- Gilead, Nurix form collaboration to develop cancer therapies

Issue 24 - Jun. 14, 2019

TCL45-24 (591 downloads)

NCAB asks for help from administration as NCI deals with deluge of grant applications
NCI and its advisors are stumped by a deep medical mystery: Why has the number of grant applications received by the institute grown by nearly 50% since 2013?
CMS dings MD Anderson on Medicare compliance, citing serious deficiencies in patient care
The Centers of Medicare and Medicaid Services has removed MD Anderson Cancer Center’s Medicare “deemed” status, which means that, until the Houston hospital demonstrates compliance with federal regulations, the institution is at risk of having its Medicare provider agreement terminated.
Review
Chernobyl, the HBO miniseries: Fact and fiction (Part III)
With episode four of the series, we moved even further from reality than in prior episodes.
Emory fires two NIH-funded faculty members for not disclosing foreign sources of funding and work in China
Emory University has terminated two NIH-funded faculty members at the Department of Genetics for failing to disclose foreign sources of funding and the extent of their involvement with institutions in People’s Republic of China.
NCTN grants awarded, with $20M increase
The National Clinical Trials Network has received a $20 million funding increase from NCI in the latest awards cycle—from $151 million to $171 million.
In Brief
- Brawley to receive 2019 AMA Distinguished Service Award
- Roswell Park’s NCI designation renewed
- NCI invites abstracts for conference on the $50M Childhood Cancer Data Initiative
- ACS, Ovarian Cancer Research Alliance form research collaboration
- ACCC, AstraZeneca to launch initiative to support care for stage III/IV NSCLC
- Krista Nelson received Leadership in Oncology Social Work Award
Conversation with The Cancer Letter
FDA’s Project Facilitate uses a call center to streamline access to unapproved cancer therapies
The FDA Oncology Center of Excellence announced a pilot program to help physicians get access to unapproved therapies for patients with cancer.
Clinical Roundup
- Cancer survivors predicted to number over 22M by 2030
- Identifying colorectal cancer subtypes in patients could lead to improved treatment decisions
- Study suggests higher triple-negative breast cancer incidence among black women is not generalizable
Drugs & Targets
- FDA approves chemoimmunotherapy regimen in diffuse large B-cell lymphoma
- FDA approves two indications for Keytruda
- FDA approves PD-L1 IHC 22C3 pharmDx assay in HNSCC
- Cofactor Genomics joins FNIH Biomarkers Consortium
The Cancer Letter wins investigative, design awards
The Cancer Letter won four 2019 Dateline Awards from the Washington, D.C. Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.

Issue 23 - Jun. 7, 2019

TCL45-23 (233 downloads)

ASCO’s mCODE seeks to compose lingua franca for cancer informatics
The American Society of Clinical Oncology published a set of common standards for cancer data elements via an initiative dubbed mCODE.
Conversation with The Cancer Letter
ASCO’s Miller: mCODE will improve downstream analytics with essential cancer data elements
The mCODE initiative, developed by American Society of Clinical Oncology and its partners, aims to optimize electronic health records to answer research questions on drug efficacy and patient outcomes.
Guest Editorial
Big Data for outcomes and clinical research: major advance or improvement needed
Creation of Big Data repositories is now emphasized at virtually all research institutions and the NIH, but the number of publications describing patient outcomes from these sources appears modest.¹ Why is this so; what factors limit what should be a hugely productive resource, and how can we improve the impact of this use of Big Data? Why does this issue require greater physician engagement and understanding to solve? The integration of clinical, laboratory, and financial data is required to describe disease and treatment outcomes as well as treatment value.
Letter from the Editor
ASCO 2019 through art
This year, we decided to approach the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology in a completely new way: through illustration.
Obituary
Henry Lynch, pioneer of hereditary cancer detection, dies at 91
Henry T. Lynch, the father of hereditary cancer detection and prevention, died June 2. He was 91.
In Brief
- Tony Kerlavage named director of NCI CBIIT
- Jeff Shilling named NCI’s chief information officer
- Jeff Settleman named senior VP, group head of oncology R&D at Pfizer
- RWJBarnabas Health and Rutgers Cancer Institute announce $750M cancer pavilion in New Brunswick
- Hackensack Meridian Health opens Center for Discovery and Innovation
- University of Indiana and MSK researchers receive $4.1 million grant from Cancer Moonshot
Funding Opportunities
DoD kidney cancer funding opportunities for FY2019
The FY19 Defense Appropriation provides $20 million to the Department of Defense Kidney Cancer Research Program to support research of exceptional scientific merit in the area of kidney cancer.
Clinical Roundup
- Study finds link between Medicaid expansion and equity in cancer care
- Long-term survival benefit shown for metastatic melanoma patients treated with Tafinlar + Mekinist
- Venclexta + Gazyva combination meets primary endpoint for CLL
- Pembrolizumab found safe in treating cancer patients with HIV
- BMS announces first presentation of results for Opdivo + Yervoy in hepatocellular carcinoma
- Lymphoma trial finds combination targeted therapy effective prior to chemotherapy
- Enfortumab vedotin produced tumor response rate of 44% in bladder cancer
- Researchers identify three-drug combination curbing growth in melanoma
- Taiho Oncology and Servier present Lonsurf data
Drugs & Targets
- FDA grants Priority Review for daratumumab combination in multiple myeloma
- Caris Life Sciences partners with Debiopharm International SA
NCI Trials
NCI Trials for June
The National Cancer Institute Cancer Therapy Evaluation Program approved the following clinical research studies last month.

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