Gastrointestinal Cancer

Aprepitant plus palonosetron and dexamethasone showed early promise for preventing chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting among patients with colorectal cancer who are undergoing FOLFOX chemotherapy, according to results of a small pilot study.

Anti-EGFR therapy is a valuable addition to the armamentarium of treatment options for patients with metastatic colorectal cancer. However, RAS mutation status is an imperfect biomarker for prediction of therapeutic outcomes in this setting. The recent discovery of tumor sidedness as a predictor of response highlights how little we understand about which patients are the most appropriate to receive drugs that target EGFR.

Adolescent obesity may be associated with an increased risk for non-cardia gastric cancer, according to the results from a cohort of almost 1.8 million men and women.

HER3 messenger RNA expression may serve as a biomarker for patients with RAS wild type colorectal cancer who will benefit from treatment with the anti-EGFR therapy panitumumab, according to the results of a new study.

A combination of oral antibiotics and mechanical bowel preparation helped to decrease the rate of surgical site infections in patients undergoing rectal cancer resections.

In this article, we provide a summary of nonoperative management of locally advanced rectal cancer in the modern era. Our focus is on technical details of tumor response and patient assessment after chemoradiotherapy, as well as a review of existing clinical data.

Follow-up intervention by patient navigators or provider reminders may help to improve the number of patients who undergo colonoscopy after positive fecal blood test results.

Treatment with adjuvant chemotherapy improved the overall survival of locally advanced gastroesophageal adenocarcinoma in patients treated with preoperative chemoradiotherapy and resection, according to the results of an analysis of the National Cancer Database.

Updated results of the FLOT4-AIO trial confirmed the superiority of a docetaxel-based triplet regimen over the current standard of care in patients with resectable esophagogastric cancer.

The FDA has granted accelerated approval to nivolumab (Opdivo) for the treatment of patients with hepatocellular carcinoma who have previously received sorafenib.

A combination of modified vaccinia Ankara-5T4 (MVA-5T4) and low-dose cyclophosphamide, or either treatment given alone, demonstrated significant survival benefit in a small group of patients with metastatic colorectal cancer compared with no treatment.

The FDA has approved the first cancer therapy biosimilar in the United States, a biosimilar to Avastin (bevacizumab) for the treatment of multiple types of cancer, including colorectal, lung, brain, kidney, and cervical cancers.

Updated results from the KEYNOTE 059 phase II trial showed that pembrolizumab alone or in combination with chemotherapy has promising antitumor activity for patients with advanced gastric or gastroesophageal junction cancer.

This video reviews some of the pros and cons of long-course and short-course radiation therapy for the neoadjuvant treatment of rectal cancer.

The use of hybrid minimally invasive esophagectomy reduced postoperative morbidity in patients with esophageal cancers, according to the results of the MIRO trial.

Significant racial and gender-based disparities exist in outcomes among patients with squamous cell carcinoma of the anus, with black men having the lowest survival rates, according to a new study.

The rate of lymph node positivity in patients with squamous cell carcinoma of the anus may be overestimated, potentially leading to the overtreatment of patients with chemoradiotherapy.

Mortality from colorectal cancer has decreased since 1970 in young black patients aged 20 to 54, but has increased in white patients since 1995 in those aged 30 to 39 years and since 2005 in those aged 40 to 54 years after decades of decreasing.

Two studies on Lynch syndrome highlight cancer screening and surveillance opportunities.

Results of a phase III trial suggest that the combination of the contemporary oral fluoropyrimidine S-1 and cisplatin offers similar efficacy to 5-flourouracil and cisplatin in patients with chemotherapy-naive diffuse type adenocarcinoma of the gastroesophageal junction or stomach.

Germline mutations in pancreatic cancer susceptibility genes were commonly identified in a group of patients with pancreatic cancer who did not report a significant family history of cancer, according to the results of a single-center study.

This video reviews the conflicting data and perspectives regarding the use of radiotherapy in unresectable pancreatic cancer.

Overweight and obesity in adolescence were associated with an increased risk for colon cancer later in life among both men and women, according to the results of a recent study.

This video examines the role of immunotherapy in pancreatic cancer, highlighting the resistance to novel treatments in this setting and trials attempting to confront this problem.

Here we review drugs that target the EGFR and VEGF pathways, focusing on patient selection, drug toxicities, and how to choose agents for first-line therapy.