A Prospective, Single-Cohort, Open, Multi-Center, Observational Study of Sublingual Fentanyl for Breakthrough Cancer Pain: Effectiveness, Safety, and Tolerability in Korean Cancer Patients.

Purpose: Fentanyl, a highly lipophilic opioid, was developed as a sublingual fentanyl tablet (SFT) for the management of breakthrough cancer pain (BTcP), and its efficacy and safety were confirmed in a randomized, controlled study. We investigated the effectiveness and safety of SFT administered to alleviate BTcP in a real-world setting.

Materials And Methods: In this prospective, open, single-cohort study, conducted in 13 referral hospitals in South Korea, opioid-tolerant cancer patients receiving around-the-clock opioids for persistent cancer pain were enrolled if the individual had BTcP ≥ 1 episode/day during the preceding week.

Quality of life outcomes in terminal cancer patients attending regional cancer centers in South Korea: protocol for a prospective cohort study.

Introduction: Patients with cancer experience physical, mental, and social pain that affects themselves and their families. The increasing cancer incidence and advances in treatment have increased the number of cancer survivors in Korea, and there is an influx of patients in Seoul and other metropolitan areas, leading to shortages of continuous care and comprehensive life support facilities. Patients must travel long distances for treatment, which poses logistical and quality-of-life challenges.

Early Integrated Palliative Care in Patients With Advanced Cancer: A Randomized Clinical Trial.

Importance: Limited data suggest that early palliative care (EPC) improves quality of life (QOL) and survival in patients with advanced cancer.

Objective: To evaluate whether comprehensive EPC improves QOL; relieves mental, social, and existential burdens; increases survival rates; and helps patients develop coping skills.

Design, Setting, And Participants: This nonblinded randomized clinical trial (RCT) recruited patients from 12 hospitals in South Korea from September 2017 to October 2018.

Intramural Gastric Abscess Misdiagnosed as Advanced Gastric Cancer.

An intramural gastric abscess is a rare condition often mistaken for other medical diseases such as gastric cancer and neoplasms. We present a case of a patient initially believed to have pancreatic cancer based on his computed tomography scan. The clinical diagnosis of locally advanced gastric cancer was made on subsequent magnetic resonance cholangiography and endoscopic ultrasound (EUS).

Circulating Tumor DNA as a Predictive Biomarker for Clinical Outcomes With Margetuximab and Pembrolizumab in Pretreated HER2-Positive Gastric/ Gastroesophageal Adenocarcinoma.

Purpose: To assess the ability of circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA)-based testing to identify patients with HER2 (encoded by ERBB2)-positive gastric/gastroesophageal adenocarcinoma (GEA) who progressed on or after trastuzumab-containing treatments were treated with combination therapy of anti-HER2 and anti-PD-1 agents.

Methods: ctDNA analysis was performed retrospectively using plasma samples collected at study entry from 86 patients participating in the phase 1/2 CP-MGAH22-05 study (NCT02689284).

Results: Objective response rate (ORR) was significantly higher in evaluable ERBB2 amplification-positive vs - negative patients based on ctDNA analysis at study entry (37% vs 6%, respectively; P = .

Foreign body removal using flexible bronchoscopy in terminal cancer: A case report.

Rationale: Pulmonary foreign body aspiration is a serious medical problem. The risk of foreign body aspiration into the airways increases considerably in patients with end stage cancer with reduced consciousness and impaired airway reflexes. However, few studies have reported on foreign body aspiration in the airways in patients with terminal cancer or receiving end-of-life care.

The Superoxide Dismutase Mimetic M40403, Improves 5-Fluorouracil-induced Small Intestinal Mucositis in a Mouse Model.

Background/aim: Intestinal mucositis with diarrhea is a dose-limiting toxicity of 5-fluorouracil (5-FU). M40403, a superoxide dismutase mimetic, was evaluated on whether it improves the mucositis with diarrhea.

Materials And Methods: BALB/c mice were treated with daily intraperitoneal injections of 5-FU±M40403 for five consecutive days.

Korean Version of the Patient Dignity Inventory: Translation and Validation in Patients With Advanced Cancer.

Context: The goal of palliative care is to maximize the quality of life and thus maintain the dignity of patients facing problems associated with a life-threatening illness. The Patient Dignity Inventory (PDI) is an instrument used to measure various sources of distress that can impact patients' sense of dignity at the end of life.

Objectives: We aimed to obtain a Korean translation of the PDI (PDI-K) and evaluate its psychometric properties in patients with advanced cancer.

The Attitudes of Physicians and the General Public toward Prognostic Disclosure of Different Serious Illnesses: a Korean Nationwide Study.

Background: Although international guidelines recommend palliative care approaches for many serious illnesses, the palliative needs of patients with serious illnesses other than cancer are often unmet, mainly due to insufficient prognosis-related discussion. We investigated physicians' and the general public's respective attitudes toward prognostic disclosure for several serious illnesses.

Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional survey of 928 physicians, sourced from 12 hospitals and the Korean Medical Association, and 1,005 members of the general public, sourced from all 17 administrative divisions in Korea.

Margetuximab plus pembrolizumab in patients with previously treated, HER2-positive gastro-oesophageal adenocarcinoma (CP-MGAH22-05): a single-arm, phase 1b-2 trial.

Background: Margetuximab, a novel, investigational, Fc-engineered, anti-HER2 monoclonal antibody, is designed to more effectively potentiate innate immunity than trastuzumab. We aimed to evaluate the safety, tolerability, and antitumour activity of margetuximab plus pembrolizumab (an anti-PD-1 monoclonal antibody) in previously treated patients with HER2-positive gastro-oesophageal adenocarcinoma.

Methods: CP-MGAH22-05 was a single-arm, open-label, phase 1b-2 dose-escalation and cohort expansion study done at 11 academic centres in the USA and Canada and 15 centres in southeast Asia (Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore) that enrolled men and women aged 18 years or older with histologically proven, unresectable, locally advanced or metastatic, HER2-positive, PD-L1-unselected gastro-oesophageal adenocarcinoma, with an Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status of 0 or 1, who had progressed after at least one previous line of therapy with trastuzumab plus chemotherapy in the locally advanced unresectable or metastatic setting.

Erratum: Correction of the Text in the Article "Table": Discordance between Physician and the General Public Perceptions of Prognostic Disclosure to Children with Serious Illness: a Korean Nationwide Study.

This corrects the article on e327 in vol. 33, PMID: 30505258.

The Impacts of Prognostic Awareness on Mood and Quality of Life Among Patients With Advanced Cancer.

Background: Accurate awareness of the prognosis is an important factor in the treatment decision of patients with advanced cancer; however, prognostic disclosure is still subject to debate because it can reduce patient's satisfaction and increase depression.

Aim: The purpose of this study is to assess whether patients' prognostic awareness is associated with decreased quality of life (QoL) or increased depressive mood in patients with advanced cancer.

Design And Participants: In this cohort study, 386 patients with advanced cancer were recruited across 3 periods from December 2016 to August 2018.

Association of illness understanding with advance care planning and end-of-life care preferences for advanced cancer patients and their family members.

Purpose: Little has been determined regarding the association between patients' and families' illness understanding and preferences for medical care. We aimed to evaluate the association of illness understanding with advance care planning (ACP) and preferences for end-of-life care, such as aggressive care, early palliative care (EPC), and hospice care, among advanced cancer patients and their family caregivers.

Methods: Patients were recruited for a prospective cohort study at outpatient and inpatient facilities in nine university hospitals in Korea (n = 150), and their primary family caregivers were also asked to participate (n = 101).

Early risk stratification for diffuse large B-cell lymphoma integrating interim Deauville score and International Prognostic Index.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the prognostic relevance of early risk stratification in diffuse large B-cell lymphoma (DLBCL) using interim Deauville score on positron emission tomography-computed tomography (PET-CT) scan and baseline International Prognostic Index (IPI). This retrospective study included 220 patients (median age, 64 years; men, 60%) diagnosed with DLBCL between 2007 and 2016 at our institution, treated with rituximab-based chemotherapy. Interim PET-CT was performed after three cycles of immuno-chemotherapy.

Exosomal miR-181b-5p Downregulation in Ascites Serves as a Potential Diagnostic Biomarker for Gastric Cancer-associated Malignant Ascites.

Purpose: Peritoneal carcinomatosis in gastric cancer (GC) patients results in extremely poor prognosis. Malignant ascites samples are the most appropriate biological material to use to evaluate biomarkers for peritoneal carcinomatosis. This study identified exosomal MicroRNAs (miRNAs) differently expressed between benign liver cirrhosis-associated ascites (LC-ascites) and malignant gastric cancer-associated ascites (GC-ascites), and validated their role as diagnostic biomarkers for GC-ascites.

Correction to: Priorities of a "good death" according to cancer patients, their family caregivers, physicians, and the general population: a nationwide survey.

While recently extending that research, however, we discovered that 236 members of the general population were mistakenly duplicated by the investigating agency (Word Research) and 1241 were reported rather than 1005. Here, we present corrections and discuss the relevant data.

A phase I/II study of poziotinib combined with paclitaxel and trastuzumab in patients with HER2-positive advanced gastric cancer.

Background: Poziotinib (HM781-36B) is an irreversible pan-HER tyrosine kinase inhibitor which targets EGFR, HER2, and HER4. This prospective, multicenter, open-label, phase I/II study determined the maximum tolerated dose (MTD) and evaluated the safety and efficacy of poziotinib combined with paclitaxel and trastuzumab in patients with HER2-positive advanced gastric cancer (GC).

Methods: Patients with HER2-positive GC previously treated with one line of chemotherapy received oral poziotinib (8 mg or 12 mg) once daily for 14 days, followed by 7 days off.

Erratum: Correction of Ethics Statement: Discordance between Physician and the General Public Perceptions of Prognostic Disclosure to Children with Serious Illness: a Korean Nationwide Study.

[This corrects the article e327 in vol. 33, PMID: 30505258.].

Attitudes of the General Public, Cancer Patients, Family Caregivers, and Physicians Toward Advance Care Planning: A Nationwide Survey Before the Enforcement of the Life-Sustaining Treatment Decision-Making Act.

Context: To respect a patient's wish for end-of-life care, "the Act on Decisions on Life-Sustaining Treatment for Patients at the End-of-Life" was enacted in South Korea in 2016. Current understanding of people who would be involved in advance care planning (ACP) is crucial to disseminate it systematically.

Objectives: The objective of this study was to investigate awareness and attitudes toward ACP in South Korea.

Treatment Patterns and Changes in Quality of Life during First-Line Palliative Chemotherapy in Korean Patients with Advanced Gastric Cancer.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to evaluate chemotherapy patterns and changes in quality of life (QOL) during first-line palliative chemotherapy for Korean patients with unresectable or metastatic/recurrent gastric cancer (GC).

Materials And Methods: Thiswas a non-interventional, multi-center, prospective, observational study of 527 patients in Korea. QOL assessments were conducted using the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) Quality of Life Questionnaires (QLQ)-C30 and QLQ-STO22 every 3 months over a 12-month period during first-line palliative chemotherapy.

Discordance between Physician and the General Public Perceptions of Prognostic Disclosure to Children with Serious Illness: a Korean Nationwide Study.

Background: It is difficult to decide whether to inform the child of the incurable illness. We investigated attitudes of the general population and physicians toward prognosis disclosure to children and associated factors in Korea.

Methods: Physicians working in one of 13 university hospitals or the National Cancer Center and members of the general public responded to the questionnaire.