medwireNews: Here we report on osteoporosis therapy in breast cancer patients, the feasibility of an alternative formulation of rituximab in follicular lymphoma, the effects of extended use of anamorelin on lung cancer-related cachexia, and the 3-year results of the COMBI-d trial.
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A post-hoc analysis of the phase III MA.27 trial, which compared adjuvant exemestane with anastrozole in postmenopausal women with hormone receptor-positive, early-stage breast cancer, shows that osteoporosis therapy is associated with improved event-free and distant disease-free survival.
The 2711 women who received osteoporosis therapy had a significant 33% reduced risk for an event and a 43% lower risk for distant disease recurrence than the 4865 participants who did not receive drugs to combat osteoporosis, reports the team led by Allan Lipton, from Penn State Hershey Medical Center in the USA, in Cancer.
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Subcutaneous administration of rituximab is a feasible option for patients with previously untreated, CD20-positive follicular lymphoma, say researchers who found comparable overall response rates among the 205 patients randomly assigned to receive subcutaneous rituximab alongside induction chemotherapy and the 205 given the conventional intravenous preparation (84.4 vs 84.9%).
As reported by Andrew Davies (Southampton General Hospital, UK) and fellow SABRINA investigators in The Lancet Haematology, overall (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) were similar between treatment arms, and so was the incidence of grade 3 or worse adverse events.
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The ghrelin receptor agonist anamorelin continues to be well tolerated and efficacious over 24 weeks in patients with advanced non-small-cell lung cancer-related cachexia, shows the ROMANA 3 trial reported in the Annals of Oncology.
In this safety extension of the phase III ROMANA 1 and ROMANA 2 trials, the incidence of treatment-emergent adverse events was comparable between the 345 participants given anamorelin and the 168 given placebo.
Moreover, David Currow (University of Technology Sydney, New South Wales, Australia) and co-researchers found that the improvements in bodyweight and anorexia–cachexia symptoms observed with anamorelin in the earlier trials were maintained with extended use.
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Researcher Georgina Long (University of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia) and co-authors have found that patients with BRAF V600E/K-mutant metastatic melanoma derive durable clinical benefits from the addition of the MEK inhibitor trametinib to dabrafenib, a BRAF inhibitor.
PFS and OS remained better with the combination than with dabrafenib monotherapy at 3 years, with rates of 22% versus 12% and 44% versus 32%, respectively, despite 12% of monotherapy-treated participants crossing over to the combination arm.
“These results support long-term use of [dabrafenib plus trametinib] as a first-line treatment strategy” in these patients, the COMBI-d investigators conclude in the Annals of Oncology.
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