Overall Survival
When mesothelioma patients are treated at mesothelioma specialty centers, they experience better care and survive longer. Kaiser Permanente Northern California Health System compared its performance before and after it transitioned into a specialty care center for mesothelioma. The doctors found a dramatic improvement in patients after the transition. Results were published in the Journal for…
A new immunotherapy treatment is showing promising results against mesothelioma. The therapy consists of a combination of two drugs: one drug that reprograms macrophages and the other is the chemotherapy cisplatin. Mesothelioma is a cancer that does not respond well to treatment. The best option for patients is a combination of surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation,…
A new tool to determine levels of asbestos exposure has been developed. The tool, created by Italian researchers, is known as a Retrospective Exposure Assessment (REA). The tool uses a microscope to determine how much asbestos is in lung tissue. The study wants to compare the actual level of asbestos in lung tissue to levels…
A new second line treatment has been developed for pleural mesothelioma. The treatment was created at the Netherlands Cancer Institute in Amsterdam. Research was done as a single-arm, open-label clinical trial combining pembrolizumab (Keytruda) and lenvatinib. The results were presented at the IASCL 2022 World Conference on Lung Cancer in Vienna, Austria. The two drugs…
A blood test could make diagnosing mesothelioma faster, leading to doctors catching the disease earlier in patients. Mesothelioma is a hard-to-treat cancer mainly caused by asbestos. Once diagnosed, not much can be done because it has usually spread and progressed to a point where treatments like surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation are not as helpful. It…
Scientists may have found an easy way to identify peritoneal mesothelioma, making it easier to detect and catch the cancer earlier. These researchers may have found a link between peritoneal mesothelioma and gastrointestinal stromal tumors. The research done in the division of surgical oncology at University of California San Diego Moores Cancer Center found a…
Researchers are performing a clinical trial hoping that they can make pleural mesothelioma a more manageable, and even survivable, disease. The clinical trial is being done at Princess Margaret Cancer Center in Toronto. The trial is known as SMARTEST, which stands for Surgery for Mesothelioma After Radiation Therapy using Exquisite Systemic Therapy. Researchers in the…
Promising results from a study on pleural mesothelioma were recently released. The study found when patients were treated with a new combination treatment, patients lived longer and had a better quality of life. The phase I clinical trial utilized a targeted cancer vaccine known as galinpepimut-S (GPS) and the immunotherapy drug Opdivo. SELLAS Life Sciences…
Over the past 20 years, the number of women dying from mesothelioma increased by 25 percent. This is happening even with less asbestos being used. Deaths in men have been falling, the reverse of what is happening in women. The information was published in the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report by the CDC. The annual…
Targeted research is advancing the treatment of pleural mesothelioma. Results from a study on a novel protein inhibitor known as tazemetostat (brand name Tazverik) were recently released. It is showing impressive results as a second line treatment for mesothelioma patients with the BAP1 genetic mutation. The control rate for disease was 54.1 percent at 12…
