ONCOLOGY Vol 27 No 1

Focal therapy is an appealing addition to our current AS strategies. As a “lesser evil,” focal therapy is showing promise as a therapy that can provide cancer control, while also avoiding many of the radical treatment–associated morbidities.

The ideal utilization of focal therapy is to treat a smaller prostate cancer in which you can ablate, excise, or render inconsequential a tumor that affects a relatively small fraction of the gland.

Such a systematic review of the current status of mTOR inhibitors in the treatment of breast cancer demonstrates holes in our knowledge of the role of the tumor, the host, and metabolic factors in breast cancer progression.

Integrating palliative care from the time of diagnosis can support both patients and families through difficult periods and prepare them for the journey ahead. It can improve quality of life while curtailing healthcare spending and increasing satisfaction with oncology care.

The body of research addressing the palliative care−oncology collaboration continues to accumulate; however, sustained efforts are needed to ensure that we are providing the best possible care for our patients.

In this review we focus on the recent evolution of the concept of focal therapy and the potential applications of this management approach within an array of options currently available for patients with localized prostate cancer.

In this article, we present or review the evidence for providing palliative care concurrently with oncologic care, guideline-based recommendations for screening and incorporation of palliative care, and a case-based discussion to demonstrate palliative care across the continuum of cancer care.

Efforts to identify clinical biomarkers of response or resistance to mTOR inhibitors are ongoing. This review will summarize results of preclinical and clinical studies as well as ongoing clinical trials with mTOR or dual PI3K/mTOR inhibitors.

Knowing the genetic makeup of patient tumors permits the development of new DNA-based diagnostics, such as BEAMing and PARE. By incorporating these new tools into future trials, we should be able to concurrently learn about drug resistance and significantly improve patient responses.

To insure standardization of all aspects of care during the conduct of a clinical trial, clinical trials should include guideline-based criteria for the management of all symptoms of cancer and its treatment, and failure to adhere to any of the standards for symptom management during the conduct of the trial should result in an equal level of protocol violation.