Randomized controlled trials that have been used for the FDA approval of new anticancer drugs were sometimes based on a flawed design, with suboptimal control arms: “Using a suboptimal control arm may bias a trial in [more]
Relief efforts aim at primary care, leaving refugees and displaced people with cancer without treatments or psychological support. In a worsening scenario, doctors are daily confronted with the hard choice between using the scarce resources [more]
New drugs being approved for treatment of patients with cancer are providing an average of only 2.5 months of extra life, a leading researcher has told the World Oncology Forum (WOF). Tito Fojo, Professor of [more]
Precision oncology is about understanding what is driving an individual’s cancer growth, resistance and metastasis, and then targeting those pathways accordingly. Our current research models are good at developing drugs to hit targets. They are [more]
Efforts to improve symptom control near the end of life have received more attention in recent years, but the impact is often frustratingly small. Simon Crompton asks where we are going wrong. Seven years ago, [more]
Cancer diagnosis seems associated with an increased risk of some mental health disorders, and increased use of psychiatric medications, according to a Swedish cohort study published on JAMA Oncology. The study by Donghao Lu and [more]
How do you decide which new cancer drugs to approve, when statistical certainty takes too long to wait for and essential evidence on quality of life is hard to measure? The head of the cancer [more]
Hospital pharmacies across Europe are experiencing frequent delays in accessing a wide range of commonly used cancer drugs. This editorial examines the extent of the problem and calls for action at an EU level to [more]
Karol Sikora, a medical oncologist who has directed cancer services at a major London hospital, triggered an angry reaction earlier this year when he suggested that younger patients should have priority when it comes to [more]
When stories exaggerate the implications of the latest research, is this the fault of the media? Asession on reporting cancer breakthroughs found pressure also comes from researchers and pharmaceutical companies. Maybe the greatest pressure comes [more]
More than 20 years since the WHO published its three-step guideline for controlling cancer pain, European patients are still complaining of pain that is long lasting, interferes with their daily activities and can even be [more]
When Pfizer followed Merck & co in withdrawing one of their COX-2 inhibitors from the market owing to increased risks of cardiovascular complications, it provided a timely reminder that medicines are not without their risks. [more]
Delivering drugs through the blood-brain barrier has always confounded scientists, but new developments in both non-invasive targeted brain delivery and brain-implanted drug formulations may provide a way forward. Download full article