Adding low-dose radiation to immunotherapy may overcome treatment resistance

CANCER DIGEST – Nov. 27, 2021 – Adding radiotherapy to immunotherapy significantly boosted response rates for treatment resistant forms of colorectal and pancreatic cancer with 37 percent of colorectal cancer patients and 29 percent of pancreatic cancer responding in a new early clinical trial under way at Massachusetts General Hospital.

“This is an impressive clinical result given that historically, these cancers respond in the low single digit percentage range,” senior author David T. Ting, MD, said in a press release.

Surviving childhood cancer carries long-term health effects

Video credit – University College London

CANCER DIGEST – Nov. 19, 2021 – Children treated for cancer had five times as many visits to the doctor or hospital for cardiovascular disease as similar people who did not have cancer, a new study shows.

Younger patient with lymphoma subtype live longer with ibrutinib added to therapy

The addition of ibrutinib to R-CHOP chemo-
therapy improved overall survival among
trial participants aged 60 and younger. –
Credit NCI

CANCER DIGEST – Nov. 6, 2021 – In a surprising result, researchers have found that adding ibrutinib (Imbruvica®), a targeted therapy, to chemotherapy can improve survival for young people with a type of the most common form of lymphoma, a new analysis in the Nov. 4, 2021 Cancer Cell shows.

The results stem from the PHOENIX clinical trial testing the combination of standard chemotherapy with the targeted therapy ibrutinib in patients with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL), the most common type of lymphoma comprising 40 percent of all lymphomas in the world.