ASCO 2015 Highlights

San Diego, CA—New research from Canada supports the use of frontline therapy with bendamustine plus rituximab for patients with indolent B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL), reported Andrew Aw, MD, MEng, FRCPC, Division of Hematology, Ottawa Hospital, Ontario, Canada, at the 2016 American Society of Hematology meeting.

San Diego, CA—A study examining the feasibility and applicability of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Value Framework in chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) suggests that the tool, although useful in assessing a small percentage of drug regimens, may need to be amended to be useful in CLL, reported Erlene K. Seymour, MD, Assistant Professor, Department of Oncology, Karmanos Cancer Institute, Wayne State University, Detroit, MI, at the 2016 American Society of Hematology meeting.

San Diego, CA—The addition of venetoclax (Venclexta) to bortezomib (Velcade) and dexamethasone yields high response rates in patients with relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma, especially in patients with disease that is not refractory to bortezomib and who received 1 to 3 previous lines of therapy, according to findings presented by Philippe Moreau, MD, Department of Hematology, Nantes University Hospital, France, at the 2016 American Society of Hematology meeting.

San Diego, CA—The investigational drug pacritinib, a JAK1/JAK2 inhibitor, achieved benefits in patients with myelofibrosis, including a significant reduction in the spleen volume compared with the best available therapy that included the JAK1/JAK2 inhibitor ruxolitinib (Jakafi), according to the phase 3 PERSIST-2 clinical trial. The results were presented by John O. Mascarenhas, MD, Tisch Cancer Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York City, at the 2016 American Society of Hematology (ASH) meeting.

San Diego, CA—Brentuximab vedotin (Adcetris) monotherapy significantly improved the objective response rate (ORR) lasting ≥4 months compared with the investigator’s choice of standard therapy in patients with cutaneous T-cell lymphoma (CTCL), reported Youn H. Kim, MD, Director, Multidisciplinary Cutaneous Lymphoma Clinic, Stanford University School of Medicine, CA, at the 2016 American Society of Hematology meeting.

San Diego, CA—Combination induction therapy with ibrutinib (Imbruvica) and rituximab (Rituxan) in patients with mantle-cell lymphoma (MCL) led to objective responses in each of the first 50 patients who received this combination in an ongoing, phase 2 clinical trial presented at the 2016 American Society of Hematology meeting.

San Diego, CA—The PD-1 inhibitor pembrolizumab (Keytruda) has good activity in patients with relapsed or refractory mycosis fungoides or Sézary syndrome, and the responses it produces are deep and durable, according to study results reported by Michael Khodadoust, MD, PhD, Medicine-Oncology, Division of Oncology, Stanford University School of Medicine, CA, at the 2016 American Society of Hematology meeting.

Washington, DC—Employers recognize that oncology care is expensive, and they are shifting their focus on cost management. As such, employers are seeking approaches to determine which drugs and health plan designs will help them manage pharmacy and medical costs to improve patient outcomes, said F. Randy Vogenberg, PhD, RPh, Partner, Access Market Intelligence, and National Institute of Collaborative Healthcare, Greenville, SC, at the Sixth Annual Conference of the Association for Value-Based Cancer Care.

Washington, DC—In the past 6 years, more than $4 billion in charitable assistance has been dedicated to patients in need. In 2015 alone, the Patient Access Network (PAN) Foundation provided $950 million in cancer care support. The only people with deep enough pockets to support this type of assistance are drug manufacturers, adding to an already complicated regulatory environment for charitable assistance programs, said Daniel J. Klein, President and Chief Executive Officer, PAN Foundation, at the Sixth Annual Conference of the Association for Value-Based ­Cancer Care.