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As the cost of cancer care continues to rise, it’s not just the patients’ finances that are affected. Recent research has linked high out-of-pocket costs to nonadherence and early discontinuation of treatment.

The PARP inhibitor olaparib significantly improved progression-free survival (PFS) compared with standard chemotherapy in women with HER2-negative metastatic breast cancer with a germline BRCA mutation. Disease progression was delayed by about 3 months with olaparib in the multinational, randomized, open-label phase 3 study known as OlympiAD, reported Mark E. Robson, MD, at the 2017 ASCO Annual Meeting.

Alectinib, a next-generation ALK inhibitor, was called a new standard of care for ALK-positive non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) based on results from the phase 3 ALEX clinical trial presented at the 2017 ASCO Annual Meeting.

In the SARC028 phase 2 multicenter trial, reported at the 2017 ASCO Annual Meeting, pembrolizumab achieved encouraging responses in soft tissue sarcoma, especially undifferentiated pleomorphic sarcoma (UPS) and liposarcoma.

Oral cediranib, an investigational VEGF inhibitor, in combination with a PARP or chemotherapy inhibitor, appears to have a survival benefit in women with relapsed platinum-sensitive ovarian cancer, according to data from 2 studies presented at the 2017 ASCO Annual Meeting.

Cancer costs are rising, but the implementation of evidence-based quality improvement strategies in early-stage breast cancer care can reduce costs and improve patient quality of life, according to Angie Meillier, RN, MS, from Abbott Northwestern Piper Breast Center in Minneapolis, MN.

Preliminary data show excellent and durable responses to atezolizumab in 10% of women with triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC), one of the most aggressive and difficult cancers to treat.

The novel combination of the investigational IDO pathway inhibitor indoximod plus pembrolizu­mab led to higher response rates in patients with advanced melanoma than what is seen with pembrolizumab alone, according to interim analysis of a phase 2 clinical trial reported at the 2017 Annual Meeting of AACR.

CAR T-cell therapy achieved excellent responses in an updated report on a series of 50 patients with relapsed B-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (B-ALL) treated with CAR T-cells at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) in New York City.

Using a “double whammy” of 2 HER2-directed therapies achieved a clinical benefit rate of 70% and an objective response rate (ORR) of 30% in patients with heavily pretreated, HER2-positive metastatic colorectal cancer (CRC), according to final results from the phase 2 HERACLES-A trial.