Solid Tumors

San Antonio, TX—Studies have suggested that musculoskeletal toxicity associated with aromatase inhibitor therapy can lead to noncompliance in up to 33% of women with breast cancer. A new, large cohort study at a single regional cancer center showed that the rate of musculoskeletal toxicity in women with early breast cancer who were treated with endocrine therapy was 64%.

San Antonio, TX—The uptake of US Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved drugs for risk reduction of breast cancer is still poor, as was confirmed by a study using the electronic health records (EHRs) from Geisinger Health System in Danville, PA.

San Antonio, TX—In a retrospective utilization and cost analysis, nab-paclitaxel (Abraxane) therapy was associated with substantially lower total use of prophylactic colony-stimulating factor (CSF) than docetaxel (Taxotere) and paclitaxel (Taxol) in the treatment of breast cancer.

San Antonio, TX—Assessing all eligible patients with breast cancer for recurrence risk with the 21-gene Oncotype DX assay at diagnosis could save $330.8 million annually by avoiding ineffective chemotherapy, according to data presented at the 2011 CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium.

Grapevine, TX—A New Jersey research team is making the case for relying less on the Oncotype DX test for breast-cancer prognosis and instead focusing on conventional pathological analyses.

San Antonio, TX—Women with estrogen receptor (ER)-positive breast cancer are unlikely to benefit from dosedense chemotherapy, but many are receiving this type of treatment, which involves the use of colonystimulating factors (CSFs), that is, growth factors. Limiting the use of these therapies in a population that is unlikely to benefit from it, would save nearly $40 million annually, suggests a study presented at the 2011 CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium.

Feedback from their peers helped physicians refrain from ordering unnecessary tests for patients with newly diagnosed cancer, according to a recent study (Miller DC, et al. J Urol. 2011;186:844-849. Epub 2011 Jul 23).

San Antonio, TX—In a randomized phase 2 study of patients with metastatic breast cancer, peripheral neuropathy was less likely to occur in patients receiving eribulin mesylate than with ixabepilone.

San Antonio, TX—When copayments were eliminated, annual screening mammography rates among insured rural women improved significantly, researchers from Duke University Comprehensive Cancer Center reported at the 2011 CTRC AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium.