JNCI

PURPOSE: Cancer survivors commonly report cognitive declines after cancer therapy. Due to the complex etiology of cancer-related cognitive decline (CRCD), predicting who will be at risk of CRCD remains a clinical challenge. We developed a model to predict breast cancer survivors who would experience CRCD after systematic treatment. PATIENTS AND METHODS.: We used the Thinking and Living with Cancer study, a large ongoing multisite prospective study of older breast cancer survivors with complete assessments pre-systemic therapy, 12-months and 24-months after initiation of systemic therapy...

BACKGROUND: Pediatric and Adolescent and Young Adult (AYA) cancer patients and caregivers are at high risk for financial toxicity and few evidence-based oncology financial and legal navigation programs exist to address it. We tested the feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary effectiveness of FINassist (Financial and Insurance Navigation Assistance), a novel interdisciplinary financial and legal navigation intervention for pediatric oncology patients and caregivers. METHODS: We used a single-arm feasibility and acceptability trial design in the Division of Pediatric Oncology and Hematology and collected pre- and post- intervention surveys to assess changes in financial toxicity (three domains: psychological response/Comprehensive Score for Financial Toxicity [COST], material conditions and coping behaviors), health related quality of life (PROMIS Physical and Mental Health, Anxiety, Depression and Parent Proxy scales), and perceived feasibility, acceptability, and appropriateness...

Stromal tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte (sTIL) enrichment in pre-treatment breast tumors has been associated with superior response to neoadjuvant treatment and survival. In a population-based cohort, we studied sTIL-survival associations by race and ethnicity. We assessed associations of continuous sTIL scores and sTIL-enriched breast cancers (defined as percent lymphocytic infiltration of tumor stroma or cell nests at cutoffs of 30%, 50%, and 70%) with clinical and epidemiologic characteristics and conducted multivariable survival analyses...

Our study investigates the trends in prostate cancer screening amid the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly focusing on racial disparities between Black and White men. Utilizing data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System from 2018, 2020, and 2022, we analyzed prostate-specific antigen screening rates in men aged 45-75 years. Our findings reveal initial declines in screening rates for both groups during the pandemic, with subsequent recovery; however, the pace of rebound differed statistically significantly between races...

BACKGROUND: Communities and researchers have called for a paradigm shift from describing health disparities to a health equity research agenda that addresses structural drivers. Therefore, we examined whether the cancer survivorship research portfolio has made this shift. METHODS: We identified grants focused on populations experiencing health disparities from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Cancer Survivorship Research Portfolio (N = 724), Fiscal Years 2017-2022...

Radiotherapy may induce off-target antitumor "abscopal" immunostimulatory but also immunosuppressive effects. Several preclinical and early clinical studies revealed promising results when combining radiation therapy with immunostimulatory agents. However, most immunoradiotherapy randomized trials showed disappointing results in patients with advanced tumors. On the contrary, encouraging outcomes were suggested when immunotherapy was delivered on top of gross disease elimination with curative-intent radiotherapy...

OBJECTIVES: Patients with bilateral Wilms tumor (BWT) initially receive neoadjuvant chemotherapy to shrink the tumors and increase the likelihood of successful nephron-sparing surgery. Biopsy of poorly responding tumors is often done to better understand therapy resistance. The purpose of this retrospective, single-institution study was to determine whether initial chemotherapy response is associated with tumor histology, potentially obviating the need for biopsy or change in chemotherapy...

BACKGROUND: Beyond demographic and immune factors, metabolic considerations, particularly metformin's recognized impact in oncology, warrant exploration in treating pancreatic cancer. This study aimed to investigate the influence of metformin on patient survival and its potential correlation with distinct immune profiles in PDAC tumors. METHODS: We included 82 upfront resected and 66 gemcitabine-based neoadjuvant chemoradiotherapy (nCRT)-treated patients from the PREOPANC randomized controlled trial (RCT)...

The COVID-19 pandemic caused widespread disruptions in cancer care. We hypothesized that the greatest disruptions in diagnosis occurred in screen-detected cancers. We identified patients (≥18 years) newly diagnosed with cancer from 2019 to 2020 in the United States National Cancer Database and calculated the change in proportion of early to late-stage cancers using a weighted linear regression. Disruptions in early-stage diagnosis were greater than late-stage diagnosis (17% vs 12.5%). Melanoma demonstrated the greatest relative decrease in early- vs late-stage diagnosis (22...

BACKGROUND: Surrogate endpoints for overall survival (OS) in patients with resectable non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) receiving neoadjuvant therapy are needed to provide earlier treatment outcomes indicators and accelerate drug approval. This study's main objectives were to investigate the association between pathologic complete response (pCR), major pathologic response (MPR), event-free survival (EFS) and OS, and to determine whether treatment effects on pCR and EFS correlate with treatment effects on OS...

BACKGROUND: Clinical trial participation at Comprehensive Cancer Centers (CCC) is inequitable for minoritized race/ethnic groups with acute leukemia. CCCs care for a high proportion of adults with acute leukemia. It is unclear if participation inequities are due to CCC access, post-access enrollment, or both. METHODS: We conducted a retrospective cohort study of adults with acute leukemia (2010-2019) residing within Massachusetts, the designated catchment area of the Dana-Farber/Harvard Cancer Center (DF/HCC)...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

PURPOSE: Cancer Genetic Risk Assessment (CGRA) is recommended for women with ovarian and high-risk breast cancer. However, the underutilization of CGRA has long been documented, and cost has been a major barrier. In this randomized controlled trial, a Tailored Counseling and Navigation (TCN) intervention significantly improved CGRA uptake at 6-month follow-up, compared with Targeted Print (TP) and Usual Care (UC). We aimed to examine the effect of removing genetic counseling costs on CGRA uptake by 12 months...

BACKGROUND: This pooled analysis of patient-level data from trials evaluated the clinical outcomes of patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC) with or without cytoreductive nephrectomy (CN) prior to a combination of immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI) and anti-angiogenic therapy. METHODS: Five trials of ICI plus anti-angiogenic therapy were pooled. Only patients with stage 4 at initial diagnosis were included to ensure that nephrectomy was done for cytoreductive purposes and not to previously treat an earlier stage of disease...

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

No abstract text is available yet for this article.

Cancer-related pain affects a significant proportion of all cancer patients yet remains inadequately managed, particularly among cancer patients from racialized backgrounds. In recent years, there has been increased research and clinical interest in the use of medical cannabis for cancer pain management, including its potential to ameliorate racialized disparities in cancer pain control. Although medical cannabis is not currently an FDA-approved treatment option for cancer-related pain, many oncologists discuss and recommend its use with their patients, underscoring the need for researchers and clinicians to proactively identify barriers to cannabis for cancer pain management that may disproportionately impact racialized cancer patients...

BACKGROUND: Many studies have examined patient-related factors affecting adjuvant hormone therapy adherence in breast cancer patients. Our study aimed to examine associations of family-related factors with adjuvant hormone therapy discontinuation and breast cancer-specific mortality. METHODS: By cross-linking seven Swedish health registers, we performed a cohort study including all breast cancer patients who initiated adjuvant hormone therapy during 2006-2019 in Sweden (N = 10,701)...