• share
• favorite_border

For families facing the end of life of a loved one with pediatric cancer, robust quality measures to benchmark what parents value most in their child’s medical care do not currently exist. A new study helps identify what parents prioritize for their children with advanced cancer, including alleviating the child’s symptoms and honoring the family’s goals and wishes.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

A technique that delivers high doses of heated chemotherapy directly to the abdominal cavity is a promising treatment for certain patients with Stage IV cancer. Hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC) kills cancer cells in the abdomen remaining after the surgical removal of tumors.

• share
• favorite_border

A new phase III study has demonstrated the efficacy of trastuzumab deruxtecan (Enhertu) in patients with HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer whose cancers were resistant to previous treatment with trastuzumab emtansine. Both trastuzumab deruxtecan and trastuzumab emtansine are antibody-drug conjugates, a relatively new type of drug that delivers chemotherapy directly to the cancer cell, minimizing damage to normal tissues.

• share
• favorite_border

This week, 18 Smilow Cancer Hospital nurses will present new oncologic research at the 48th Annual Congress of the Oncology Nursing Society in San Antonio, Texas. Their findings will be revealed during poster and oral presentation sessions from April 26th through April 30th. Some of the featured oral presentation topics include “Designing a Novel Educational Program to Decrease Ambulatory Falls with Injury,” “Monoclonal Antibody Education for Non-Oncology RNs,” and “Oncology Advanced Practice Provider Productivity: Measuring and Justifying our Worth.

• share
• favorite_border

The complete “Top Doctors” list appears in the May 2023 issue of Connecticut Magazine. Congratulations to this year’s “Top Doctors” affiliated with Smilow Cancer Hospital and Yale Cancer Center.

• share
• favorite_border

The members of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) have elected Patricia M. LoRusso, DO, PhD (hc), as the AACR President-Elect for 2023-2024. Dr. LoRusso will become President-Elect on Monday, April 17, during the AACR’s Annual Business Meeting of Members at the AACR Annual Meeting 2023 in Orlando, Florida. She will assume the Presidency in April 2024 at the AACR Annual Meeting in San Diego, California.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

Yale Cancer Center (YCC) and Smilow Cancer Hospital (SCH) physicians and scientists are presenting research studies at the 2023 American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Annual Meeting at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, Florida, April 14 to 19th.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

Each person has about 4 million sequence differences in their genome relative to the reference human genome. These differences are known as variants. A central goal in precision medicine is understanding which of these variants contribute to disease in a particular patient.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

Nearly double the number of young adults under 55 are being diagnosed with colorectal cancer than a decade ago. This most recent significant increase in CRC among the younger population, Dr. Xavier Llor says, is more associated with a patient’s environment, including all sorts of exposures, and diet.

• share
• favorite_border

The members of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) have elected Patricia M. LoRusso, DO, PhD (hc), as the AACR President-Elect for 2023-2024. Dr. LoRusso will become President-Elect on Monday, April 17, during the AACR’s Annual Business Meeting of Members at the AACR Annual Meeting 2023 in Orlando, Florida. She will assume the Presidency in April 2024 at the AACR Annual Meeting in San Diego, California.

• share
• favorite_border

In 2012, Michael Cruz exercised a lot. Four years into a 15-year prison sentence, this was one of the only things he had, he says, until he noticed a numb, tingling sensation in one of his toes while working out. At first, he dismissed the feeling. But it persisted, and over time, spread up his ankle. Then, he began experiencing little sharp pains in his back, which he attributed to muscle spasms from his workouts.

• share
• favorite_border

Today, Yale Medicine physicians use a new form of technology called “robotic bronchoscopy,” which allows them to better reach smaller parts of the lungs. During a robotic bronchoscopy, the doctor uses a controller at a console to operate a robotic arm, which then guides the bronchoscope’s thin, flexible tube through the airways.

• share
• favorite_border

With the arrival of March, Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month, faculty and staff in the Department of Internal Medicine’s Section of Digestive Diseases are redoubling their efforts to spread the word about the importance of screening, especially in younger individuals and those with a family history of the disease. Colorectal cancer is the second most common cause of cancer death in the United States.

• share
• favorite_border

The constant evolution of new COVID-19 variants makes it critical for clinicians to have multiple therapies in their arsenal for treating drug-resistant infections. Researchers have now discovered that a new class of oral drugs that acts directly on human cells can inhibit a diverse range of pathogenic SARS-CoV-2 strains. In their newly published study, the team found a novel mechanism through which the gene that expresses angiotensin converting enzyme-2 (ACE-2)—the cellular receptor to which SARS-CoV-2 binds so that it can enter and infect the cell—is turned on.

• share
• favorite_border

To assess the impact of hospitalist co-management, researchers compared real-time outcomes from both the co-management model and the traditional, oncologist-led inpatient services. They tracked patient volume, length of stay, early discharges, discharge time, and the rate of readmission within 30 days of discharge over a six-month span at Smilow Cancer Hospital in New Haven, Conn.

• share
• favorite_border

Dr. Marcus Bosenberg, an accomplished clinician, teacher, and researcher who studies the factors that regulate anti-cancer immune responses, was recently appointed the Anthony N. Brady Professor of Dermatology, Pathology, and Immunobiology, effective immediately.Bosenberg received his Ph.D. and M.D. at Cornell University Medical College.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

A team of Yale scientists seeks to determine which treatment sequences produce the best results for people with advanced cancer while examining the cost of these treatments. The investigators recently received a four-year, $792,000 grant from the American Cancer Society to fund their studies. Shi-Yi Wang, associate professor of epidemiology (chronic diseases) at Yale School of Public Health (YSPH) is the principal investigator for the grant.

• share
• favorite_border

The intent of the new Consortium is to help increase access to early phase cancer clinical trials for patients who would otherwise not have the ability to be treated with novel investigational therapeutic interventions.

• share
• favorite_border

• share
• favorite_border

A Yale-led study examines the potential environmental benefits of more carefully selecting patients for prostate biopsy in a way that can also spare low-yield and potentially harmful procedures

• share
• favorite_border

Early diagnosis of uterine cancer is known to improve a patient’s chances for survival, but previous research has found that Black patients are less likely to receive early diagnoses than people of other racial and ethnic groups. A new analysis by Yale researchers provides insights into why that is: They found that Black patients were more likely than their white counterparts to experience testing delays or to not receive recommended tests at all.

• share
• favorite_border

A team of researchers from Yale and the University of Connecticut (UConn) has developed a nanoparticle-based treatment that targets multiple culprits in glioblastoma, a particularly aggressive and deadly form of brain cancer.

• share
• favorite_border

Age-based heuristics can lead to large differences in breast cancer treatment based on small differences in chronologic age, according to a new analysis of more than 500,000 patient records. Radiation therapy often is given after breast-conserving surgery to help prevent a patient’s cancer from returning.

• share
• favorite_border

New research from Yale Cancer Center identified that two simple biomarkers, immune cells and estrogen receptor levels, could differentiate which young women with ER+ breast cancer need chemotherapy to improve their survival, and which only need a monthly injection to suppress ovarian function.The findings were recently published in npjBreast, Nature Partner Journals.

• share
• favorite_border

New research from Yale Cancer Center reveals for the first time ever a differential clinical response to pembrolizumab in Lynch-like (mutated) vs methylated microsatellite instability-high (MSI-H) uterine cancer patients, increasing our understanding about the proportion of patients that derive benefit from immune checkpoint blockade.

• share
• favorite_border

The American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) and the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) have issued an updated policy, regarding the use of electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS). Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, is corresponding author on the statement published today in both Clinical Cancer Research and the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

• share
• favorite_border

In a study published today in JAMA Oncology, researchers at Yale Cancer Center in collaboration with researchers from Flatiron Health, Inc., revealed that despite recommendations, aggressive cancer care at the end-of-life persists and there has been a substantial transition from the use of chemotherapy to immunotherapy.

• share
• favorite_border

New research from Yale Cancer Center reveals a higher risk of cancer mortality in incarcerated adults, as well as among those diagnosed with cancer in the first year after release from prison.The findings were published today in the journal PLOS ONE. “Cancer is the leading cause of death among people in prison, accounting for about 30% of all deaths, and yet the complex relationship between incarceration and cancer survival had not been thoroughly evaluated,” said Dr.

• share
• favorite_border

Newly released results from the Phase III ADAURA trial reveal that osimertinib yielded a 5.5-year median disease-free survival in the post-surgical treatment of patients with EGFR-mutated lung cancer, and nearly three in four patients treated with adjuvant osimertinib were disease-free at four years. The new results also indicated that the use of osimertinib reduced the risk of disease recurrence in the brain and spinal cord.

• share
• favorite_border

Although there has been a significant increase in the number of U.S. residents insured through Medicaid since the expansion of the Patient Protection and Afforadble Care Act (ACA) in March 2010, the ability of Medicaid-insured patients to access cancer care services has not been well understood. In a study published today in the journal JAMA Network Open, researchers at Yale Cancer Center assessed the acceptance of Medicaid insurance among patients diagnosed with common cancers.

• share
• favorite_border

Michael Cecchini, MD, recently received a K08 grant from the NCI to conduct research aimed at investigating multiple clinical trials for patients with colorectal cancer. The first trial is a Phase II study in which patients will be treated with a combination not normally used against colorectal cancer: temozolomide (TMZ), a well-known drug, and olaparib, from the relatively new class of drugs of PARP inhibitors.

• share
• favorite_border

Smilow Cancer Hospital is now offering a new surgical option for prostate cancer treatment unavailable elsewhere in Connecticut, and still rare throughout the United States. The beneficiaries are men in need of a prostatectomy, a procedure in which the prostate is partially or completely removed to eradicate localized cancer.

• share
• favorite_border

Eric Winer, MD, began his tenure at Yale in February 2022 with a vision to expand the cancer program and national prominence of Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital. He is already recruiting more physicians and researchers and focusing on healthcare inequities in Connecticut.

• share
• favorite_border

Scientists at Yale Cancer Center have found that patients with breast cancer and high levels of insulin in the blood may be responsive to metabolism-targeting treatments, which in turn may improve the effectiveness of subsequent chemotherapy treatments.

• share
• favorite_border

In a study led by Dr. Lajos Pusztai, Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology) at Yale Cancer Center, researchers across various institutions, and on behalf of the I-SPY consortium, developed a novel continuous residual cancer based metric to compare neoadjuvant chemotherapy efficacy between randomized trial arms in preoperative breast cancer trials.

• share
• favorite_border

New research from Yale Cancer Center provides a new understanding of patients’ views of artificial intelligence (AI) in health care. W

• share
• favorite_border

The phase 2 clinical trial of a multi-center study known as the COAST clinical trial has demonstrated improved outcomes using immunotherapy combinations for patients with unresectable stage III non-small cell lung cancer, according to researchers at Yale Cancer Center and participating organizations.

• share
• favorite_border

Following an analysis of over 12,000 human genes, research from Yale Cancer Center indicates there is cancer-relevant importance in a much larger proportion of human genes than current cancer research models suggest.

• share
• favorite_border

African-American adult patients are more likely than white patients to receive substandard gastrointestinal cancer surgery, according a large study led by researchers at Yale Cancer Center. The findings are reported today in the journal JAMA Network Open.

• share
• favorite_border

An analysis by Yale Cancer Center researchers identified accelerated genetic aging in breast tissue adjacent to breast cancer tumors. Their findings demonstate that adjacent breast tissue is “biologically older” than the chronologic age of the patient, a discovery that may explain why some women develop breast cancer at younger age and may also become a future marker of breast cancer risk.

• share
• favorite_border

Scientists at Yale Cancer Center have discovered new consequences of specific gene mutations that play a role in the development of myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) and acute myeloid leukemia (AML).

• share
• favorite_border

A Yale Cancer Center research team has identified novel oncogenic gene fusions in lung and pancreatic cancer, as well as sarcoma.

• share
• favorite_border

The National Cancer Institute recently awarded Yale Cancer Center and Yale School of Public Health a new U01 cooperative agreement grant to support research into the impact of diet and exercise for women with ovarian cancer.

• share
• favorite_border

Findings from a new study led by Yale Cancer Center researchers show enfortumab vedotin is effective in patients with muscle-invasive bladder cancer (MIBC) not eligible for cisplatin chemotherapy.

• share
• favorite_border

A new study led by researchers at Yale Cancer Center and the University of Maryland shows ixabepilone plus bevacizumab (IXA+BEV) is a well-tolerated, effective combination for treatment of platinum/taxane-resistant ovarian cancer compared to ixabepilone (IXA) alone.