Latest Conference Articles

While always uncertain, the future seems more so in economic hard times. How can you know how best to respond to changes in patient volume or reimbursement?

Many women who survive breast cancer spend a lot of time worrying about the risk of recurrence, but a study presented at the ASCO Breast Cancer Symposium in San Francisco suggests at least three-quarters of the women have as much risk of suffering a serious cardiovascular event, such as heart attack or stroke. Aditya Bradia, MD, a fellow at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, presented the data from the study, which was a 2009 Breast Cancer Symposium Merit Award Recipient.

There remains a great deal of uncertainty surrounding the economic stimulus package incentives and the steps practices must take to receive these incentives. This session will provide an overview of HIT, EHR and TeleHealth incentives related to the stimulus package and prepare practices for what they must do to adopt and "meaningfully use" certified EHRs . An HIT and government affairs expert will help create a roadmap for the term "meaningful use" and inform practices on how to follow this map.

Poly(ADP-Ribose) Polymerase (PARP) inhibitors have been gaining increasing attention as a possible breakthrough in the treatment of triple negative breast cancer and cancers with mutations in BRCA1, BRCA2, or PTEN genes. Several studies attesting to the efficacy of PARP inhibitors in breast and ovarian cancer were presented at the 2009 ASCO Annual Meeting. Antoinette Tan, MD, assistant professor, The Cancer Institute of New Jersey, provided an “Update on the Clinical Status of PARP Inhibitors for the Treatment of Breast Cancer” in a special session at the Breast Cancer Symposium in San Francisco, California.

The identification of an association between mutations in BRCA 1/2 and hereditary breast and ovarian cancer has allowed many women to learn of their increased cancer risk at a young age and take measures to identify developing tumors early. According to Jennifer Litton, MD, assistant professor, Department of Breast Medical Oncology, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, women positive for a deleterious eVmutation in one of the BRCA genes typically receive a breast cancer diagnosis 6 years earlier than did mothers or aunts with the mutation who had breast or ovarian cancer.

Breast cancer survival outcomes vary significantly according to race in the United States, but a University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center found that race/ethnicity did not significantly affect the rate of pathologically complete response (pCR) in women with locally advanced breast cancer treated with neoadjuvant chemotherapy.

Quality of life (QOL) is an important consideration for clinicians when treating patients. Treatments that diminish QOL can result in the patient discontinuing therapy or switching to another drug. Either can thwart efforts to control tumor growth. Beth Sherrill, MS, Global Head, Biometrics, RTI Health Solutions, Research Triangle Park in North Carolina, and associates sought to determine the effects on QOL of adding lapatinib (Tykerb) to letrozole (Femara) in women with HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer (MBC).

HER2-positive breast cancer has long been recognized as an aggressive disease, but women with small node-negative tumors are considered low risk for recurrence and do not always receive adjuvant therapy. Data presented by Heather L. McArthur, MD, MPH, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York, and colleagues in a poster session at this week’s Breast Cancer Symposium in San Francisco suggests perhaps they should. In comparing outcomes between women who received adjuvant trastuzumab for low-risk HER2-positive tumors and those treated before trastuzumab was available, they concluded adjuvant trastuzumab (Herceptin) reduces recurrence rates and mortality.

In 30% of women with early stage breast cancer who were scheduled for lumpectomy, axillary ultrasound (AUS) combined with fine-needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) allowed researchers to detect macrometastases in axillary lymph nodes prior to resection, sparing the patients from subsequent sentinel lymph node biopsy (SLNB). Data were presented at the ASCO Breast Cancer Symposium in a general session titled “Controversies in the Management of the Axilla.”

Ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS) typically begins in a milk duct and is the most common type of noninvasive early stage breast cancer. It represents nearly one-quarter of new breast cancer diagnoses annually.

In the quest to improve personalization of cancer treatment, the CALGB (Cancer and Leukemia Group B) Cooperative in Canada discovered that women with basal type breast cancer benefit from adding paclitaxel (Taxol) to standard chemotherapy.

The results of a large, randomized, population-based study presented at the 2009 ASCO Breast Cancer Symposium indicate that the rate of death from breast cancer is 56% for women not participating in mammogram screening programs versus 4.7% for those on the recommended screening schedule.

LifeMojo.com, QuitNet.com, HappyMind, Sensei.com, TheCarrot.com, 23andme.com, CapMed.com%u2026all used to help %u201Creal%u201D patients track their health.

Health 2.0 is participatory healthcare that allows individuals the ability to rapidly share, classify, and summarize health information.

Managing a chronic disease online is too heavy; get into the simple stuff first and then make it a more natural transition to these bigger problems.

Chris Schroeder discusses the difference between HealthCentral and other healthcare websites.

Search, social networks, and tools, along with content, transaction data are all part of the equation, but now we%u2019re starting to put it all together.

We%u2019ve come a long way with patients but we are still at the periphery. The %u201Cpatient-central%u201D model is nice, but it%u2019s not real right now.

Chris Rauber discussed the partnerships between Eliza and other organizations with Alexandra Drane.

What is clinical groupware? It is the next-generation of EMR/EHR technology, but that understates the dimension.

John Eastman of WebLAB, gave a quick spiel about his company before introducing Aneesh Chopra, the Chief Technology Officer for the US Government.

Preliminary data from a phase 3 study show that panitumumab (Vectibix) added to standard FOLFOX chemotherapy as a first-line treatment for metastatic colorectal cancer significantly improves PFS in patients with wild-type KRAS.

Updated data from IES (Intergroup Exemestane Study) showed that sequencing therapy with tamoxifen followed by exemestane (Aromasin) prolonged disease-free survival and overall survival in postmenopausal women with early stage breast cancer.

Dr David Melisi, National Cancer Institute, Naples, Italy, and colleagues presented data at ECCO 15-ESMO 34 today identifying the transforming growth factor (TGF) beta-activated kinase-1 enzyme, known as TAK-1, as a possible target in pancreatic cancer.

The Austrian Breast and Colorectal Cancer Study Group (ABCSG) presented new data from the ABCSG-24 trial, which has been investigating adjuvant treatment with capecitabine (Xeloda) plus a standard chemotherapy regimen of epirubicin and docetaxel (Taxotere) in women with early stage breast cancer.

Developing targeted pharmacotherapies to personalize cancer care has become the mantra in oncology, and now a team of scientists from The Netherlands, Belgium, Germany, and Canada has taken the first step toward targeting radiotherapy dosages to individual patients by assessing the genetic characteristics of individuals with hypersensitivity to radiation therapy.

Sorafenib (Nexavar) significantly improved progression-free survival in patients with breast cancer, according to the results of the SOLTI-0701 study presented at the ECCO 15 – ESMO 34 Joint Congress by José Baselga, MD, ESMO president and a member of the ECCO executive committee, and head of oncology, Vall d’Hebron University Hospital, Barcelona, Spain.

Approximately three quarters of funding for cancer research goes to biology research and drug development in Europe, and this concerns Professor Richard Sullivan, King’s Health Partners Integrated Cancer Centre in London and chairman of the European Cancer Research Managers Forum.

Prof Cuzick told an attentive audience at the ECCO 15-ESMO 34 Joint Congress that he believes new HPV vaccines on the horizon, which are effective against 9 strains of HPV, coupled with a shift to molecular HPV screening, could allow countries to eradicate cervical cancer within their borders.

Heating soft-tissue sarcomas during chemotherapy was associated with a significant reduction in the risk of recurrence and death, according to data presented by Professor Rolf Issels, professor of medical oncology, Klinikum Grosshadern Medical Center, University of Munich in Germany.