Journal of clinical oncology : official journal of the American Society of Clinical Oncology
-
One third of patients with triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) achieve pathologic complete response (pCR) with standard neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NACT). CALGB 40603 (Alliance), a 2 × 2 factorial, open-label, randomized phase II trial, evaluated the impact of adding carboplatin and/or bevacizumab. ⋯ In stage II to III TNBC, addition of either carboplatin or bevacizumab to NACT increased pCR rates, but whether this will improve relapse-free or overall survival is unknown. Given results from recently reported adjuvant trials, further investigation of bevacizumab in this setting is unlikely, but the role of carboplatin could be evaluated in definitive studies, ideally limited to biologically defined patient subsets most likely to benefit from this agent.
-
Hospital surgical volume has been shown to correlate with short-term outcomes after cancer surgery, but the relationship between volume and cost of care is unclear. We sought to characterize variation in payments for cancer surgery and assess the relationship between hospital volume and payments. ⋯ We found substantial variation in Medicare payments for these six cancer procedures. Cost was strongly associated with postoperative complications and primarily driven by differences in the cost of the index hospitalization. Efforts to prevent and cost-effectively manage complications are more likely to reduce costs than volume-based referral of cancer surgery alone.
-
Randomized Controlled Trial
Impact of spin in the abstracts of articles reporting results of randomized controlled trials in the field of cancer: the SPIIN randomized controlled trial.
We aimed to assess the impact of spin (ie, reporting to convince readers that the beneficial effect of the experimental treatment is greater than shown by the results) on the interpretation of results of abstracts of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) in the field of cancer. ⋯ Spin in abstracts can have an impact on clinicians' interpretation of the trial results.
-
Patients with relapsed or refractory acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) have a dismal prognosis. CD19 is homogenously expressed in B-precursor ALL and can be targeted by the investigational bispecific T cell-engager antibody blinatumomab. A phase II trial was performed to determine clinical activity in this patient cohort. ⋯ The data support further investigation of blinatumomab for the treatment of adult patients with relapsed or refractory ALL in a larger confirmatory study.
-
Pain is a frequent symptom in patients with cancer, with substantial impact. Despite the availability of opioids and updated guidelines from reliable leading societies, undertreatment is still frequent. ⋯ Analysis of 46 articles published from 1994 to 2013 using the PMI to assess the adequacy of analgesic therapy suggests the quality of pharmacologic pain management has improved. However, approximately one third of patients still do not receive pain medication proportional to their pain intensity.