The ATLANTIS trial has found no significant overall survival improvement with the combination of lurbinectedin and doxorubicin versus chemotherapy in previously treated patients with small-cell lung cancer.

Targeted delivery of doxorubicin using a thermosensitive liposomal preparation triggered by focused ultrasound appears to be a viable option for the treatment of liver tumors, according to the proof-of-concept TARDOX study.

Hector Villarraga (Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota, USA) and co-authors were unable to confirm a dose–response relationship between anthracycline use and CHF, finding no significant difference in the risks associated with cumulative doxorubicin or equivalent doses of less than 180 mg/m 2 , 180–250 mg/m 2 , or more than 250 mg/m 2 .

This was followed by four cycles of doxorubicin 60 mg/m 2 and cyclophosphamide 600 mg/m 2 given every 2 weeks and surgery.

Serious TRAEs were reported in 31% of the patients given veliparib and 36% of controls, with one sepsis death in the veliparib arm and one death from acute cisplatin-related kidney injury in combination with doxorubicin-related heart failure in the control arm.

The researchers note that their findings contrast with those of the IMpassion050 trial, which combined neoadjuvant atezolizumab or placebo with dose-dense doxorubicin and cyclophosphamide and found no difference in the pCR rate between the two treatment arms in either the intention-to-treat or PD-L1–positive populations.

For the study, his team used the Infinium MethylationEPIC BeadChip array to interrogate over 850,000 methylation sites across the genome in plasma samples taken from 72 patients with urothelial carcinoma (T2 to T4a, N0, M0) on day 1 of cycle 1 of neoadjuvant chemotherapy with either gemcitabine plus cisplatin or dose-dense methotrexate, vinblastine, doxorubicin, and cisplatin.

Neoadjuvant dose-dense methotrexate, vinblastine, doxorubicin, and cisplatin may delay disease progression or death versus gemcitabine plus cisplatin in people with nonmetastatic muscle-invasive bladder cancer, research suggests.

All patients received four cycles of doxorubicin plus cyclophosphamide after completion of the randomized regimens and before undergoing surgery.

In all, 1174 patients with previously untreated, nonmetastatic (stage T1c N1-2 or T2-4 N0-2), triple-negative disease were randomly allocated to treatment with neoadjuvant pembrolizumab 200 mg (n=784) or placebo (n=390) every 3 weeks, each given with four cycles of paclitaxel plus carboplatin, followed by four cycles of doxorubicin or epirubicin plus cyclophosphamide.

In the phase 3 study, 454 patients with clinical stage T2–T4, N1–N3, M0 disease were randomly assigned to receive atezolizumab or placebo alongside four cycles of neoadjuvant dose-dense doxorubicin plus cyclophosphamide.

The 397 patients with stage IIA–III disease recruited to the open-label, phase 2 cardiac safety study were assigned by physician’s choice to receive one of the neoadjuvant treatment regimens outlined below: four cycles of dose-dense doxorubicin plus cyclophosphamide (AC) followed by 12 cycles of weekly paclitaxel alongside four cycles of concurrent pertuzumab–trastuzumab every 3 weeks; four cycles of 5-fluorouracil, epirubicin, and cyclophosphamide (FEC) every 3 weeks followed by four cycles of docetaxel alongside four cycles of concurrent pertuzumab–trastuzumab every 3 weeks.

The doxorubicin conjugate aldoxorubicin could be a suitable alternative to standard therapies for patients with relapsed or refractory soft tissue sarcoma, say researchers.

This was followed by the same dose of atezolizumab or placebo together with doxorubicin 60 mg/m 2 plus cyclophosphamide 600 mg/m 2 every 2 weeks for a further 8 weeks.

The team analyzed data from the 1346 normal-weight (BMI ≥18.5 and <25 kg/m 2 ), 951 overweight (≥25 and <30 kg/m 2 ), and 542 obese (≥30 kg/m 2 ) participants of the BIG 2-98 trial that investigated the sequential or concurrent addition of docetaxel to adjuvant doxorubicin, cyclophosphamide, methotrexate, and fluorouracil for clinical stage T1–T3 disease with at least one positive lymph node.

They continue: “Further studies may provide additional data, including a phase 1 study of T-DM1 plus nonpegylated liposomal doxorubicin (MEDOPP038; THELMA).

This was higher than the 20% estimated pCR rate for the 299 control participants who received just the chemotherapy regimen of paclitaxel and subsequent doxorubicin plus cyclophosphamide.

Neoadjuvant chemotherapy with dose-dense methotrexate, vinblastine, doxorubicin, and cisplatin achieves better outcomes than gemcitabine plus cisplatin or carboplatin in patients with muscle-invasive bladder cancer, research shows.

Resiquimod Synthetic hypericin (SGX30) Remetinostat gel Micro-needle array-doxorubicin Table 1: Early stage agents.