Gastrointestinal Cancer

Nathan Bahary, MD, PhD, discusses the role of pemigatinib in biliary tract cancers.

December 17, 2020 - The FDA has granted priority review to a new supplemental biologics license application for pembrolizumab in combination with platinum- and fluoropyrimidine-based chemotherapy as a first-line treatment in patients with locally advanced unresectable or metastatic esophageal and gastroesophageal junction cancer.

Timothy Price, MBBS, DHthSc, FRACP, discusses the rationale to evaluate sotorasib in gastrointestinal cancers.

December 16, 2020 - The combination of motixafortide plus pembrolizumab and chemotherapy was found to result in a substantial improvement in overall survival, progression-free survival, and overall response rate when used as a second-line treatment in patients with stage IV pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma.

Michael J. Cavnar, MD, discusses ​surgical differences between right- and left-sided tumors in colorectal cancer.

Prakash Pandalai, MD, discusses the development of peritoneal carcinomatosis in colorectal cancer.

Joseph Kim, MD, discusses the multidisciplinary management of hepatocellular carcinoma.

December 14, 2020 - Microsatellite instability–high tumors in patients with endometrial, colorectal, and stomach carcinomas were found to be enriched in recurrent shared, immunogenic, tumor-specific frameshifts expressed on RNA and protein levels.

December 14, 2020 - Immunotherapy agents have shown efficacy in malignant melanoma, kidney cancer, and non–small cell lung cancer, and investigators are examining the efficacy of checkpoint inhibitors in less immunogenic tumors such as colon cancer, particularly in tumors with high microsatellite instability and deficient mismatch repair genes.

December 11, 2020 - The European Medicine Agency’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use has adopted a positive opinion for pembrolizumab monotherapy for the frontline treatment of adult patients with metastatic microsatellite instability–high or mismatch repair deficient colorectal cancer.

December 11, 2020 - Oncolytic viral therapy has been heavily investigated across oncology, but plenty of work still lies ahead to determine how this treatment approach can be applied in gastrointestinal malignancies.

Yelena Y. Janjigian, MD, discusses the emergence of new treatment options in esophageal and gastric cancer.

Axel Grothey, MD, discusses investigational combination therapies in microsatellite instability–high colorectal cancer.

Nathan Bahary, MD, PhD, discusses the importance of seeking targetable alterations in GI cancers, as well as recent advancements in the space.

December 7, 2020 - The survival benefit of the novel agent fruquintinib will be tested during the phase 3 FRESCO-2 trial in patients with metastatic colorectal cancer who are either intolerant to or have received 3 prior lines of chemotherapy.

Jordan D. Berlin, MD, discusses the unmet needs in pancreatic cancer treatment and ongoing research efforts with nanoliposomal irinotecan.

Joseph Kim, MD, discusses the evolution of therapy in metastatic hepatocellular carcinoma.

December 1, 2020 - The FDA has granted a priority review designation to the oral FGFR1-3 selective inhibitor infigratinib for the treatment of patients with cholangiocarcinoma.

Vincent J. Picozzi Jr, MD, spotlights the launch of PanCAN’s Precision Promise clinical trial platform, and how it is expected to impact clinical practice.

The Japanese Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare has approved cabozantinib for the treatment of patients with unresectable hepatocellular carcinoma that has progressed on prior systemic therapy.

November 30, 2020 - The FDA has granted a breakthrough therapy designation to zanidatamab for the treatment of patients with HER2 gene–amplified biliary tract cancer who have received prior therapy.

Laparoscopic distal gastrectomy with D2 lymphadenectomy demonstrated comparable rates of 3-year relapse-free survival vs open distal gastrectomy in patients with locally advanced gastric cancer.

Joseph Kim, MD, discusses curative therapeutic options in hepatocellular carcinoma.

Milind Javle, MD, provides insight into the current treatment paradigm of advanced HCC and the potential influence ongoing research regarding biomarkers of response and novel combinations could have on the field.

November 24, 2020 - The European Commission has approved nivolumab for the treatment of adult patients with unresectable advanced, recurrent or metastatic esophageal squamous cell carcinoma following prior fluoropyrimidine- and platinum-based combination chemotherapy.

Yelena Y. Janjigian, MD, discusses the importance of selecting ​an optimal first-line therap​y in gastric cancer.

November 24, 2020 - Until now, the field of cell-based immunotherapy has been dominated by chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells, with groundbreaking FDA approvals for 3 drugs across several types of hematologic malignancies. In solid tumors, however, CAR T-cell therapies have yet to gain ground.

Timothy Price, MBBS, DHthSc, FRACP, discusses challenges faced during the CodeBreaK 100 trial in gastrointestinal cancers.

November 23, 2020 - Yelena Y. Janjigian, MD, discusses future research efforts are focused on examining anti–PD-1 combination strategies, particularly with HER2-directed therapies.

Sotorasib was well tolerated and led to disease control in the majority of patients with heavily pretreated KRAS G12C–mutant gastrointestinal malignancies.