Outcomes following long-term disease control with immune checkpoint inhibitors in patients with advanced melanoma.

Immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICI) can achieve durable responses in patients with advanced melanoma, and results from clinical trials suggest cure may be possible for a subset of patients. Despite clinical trial data, little is known about the risk, character, and clinical outcome of late recurrences after ICI. This study aimed to explore the disease outcomes and survival in a cohort of patients with long-term responses to ICI.

Therapeutic drug monitoring of osimertinib in EGFR mutant non-small cell lung cancer by dried blood spot and plasma collection: A pilot study.

Aims: Therapeutic drug monitoring (TDM) has led to significant improvements in individualized medical care, although its implementation in oncology has been limited to date. Tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) are a group of therapies for which TDM has been suggested. Osimertinib is one such therapy used in the treatment of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) mutation-driven lung cancer.

First-line chemoimmunotherapy and immunotherapy in patients with non-small cell lung cancer and brain metastases: a registry study.

Introduction: Brain metastases commonly occur in patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Standard first-line treatment for NSCLC, without an EGFR, ALK or ROS1 mutation, is either chemoimmunotherapy or anti-PD-1 monotherapy. Traditionally, patients with symptomatic or untreated brain metastases were excluded from the pivotal clinical trials that established first-line treatment recommendations.

Real world efficacy and toxicity of consolidation durvalumab following chemoradiotherapy in older Australian patients with unresectable stage III non-small cell lung cancer.

Introduction: Consolidation durvalumab following platinum-based chemoradiotherapy (CRT) significantly improved overall survival for patients with unresectable stage III non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) in the PACIFIC trial. However, older patients were underrepresented in PACIFIC, and subsequent analyses suggested trends toward poorer survival and increased toxicity in patients aged ≥70 years old. We assessed the effectiveness and safety of consolidation durvalumab following CRT in older Australian patients with unresectable stage III NSCLC.

Interdependencies of the Neuronal, Immune and Tumor Microenvironment in Gliomas.

Gliomas are the most common primary brain malignancy and are universally fatal. Despite significant breakthrough in understanding tumor biology, treatment breakthroughs have been limited. There is a growing appreciation that major limitations on effective treatment are related to the unique and highly complex glioma tumor microenvironment (TME).

PSMA Expression Correlates with Improved Overall Survival and VEGF Expression in Glioblastoma.

Background: Glioblastomas are the most common and fatal primary brain malignancy in adults. There is a growing interest in identifying the molecular mechanisms of these tumors to develop novel treatments. Glioblastoma neo-angiogenesis is driven by VEGF, and another potential molecule linked to angiogenesis is PSMA.

LOREALAUS: LOrlatinib REAL-World AUStralian Experience in Advanced ALK-Rearranged NSCLC.

Introduction: Over the past decade, ALK tyrosine kinase inhibitors have delivered unprecedented survival for individuals with -positive () lung cancers. Real-world data enhance the understanding of optimal drug sequencing and expectations for survival.

Methods: Multicenter real-world study of individuals with pretreated advanced lung cancers managed on a lorlatinib access program between 2016 and 2020.

Implications of Concurrent and Mutations on Survival in Glioma-A Case Report and Systematic Review.

Both (isocitrate dehydrogenase 1) and (isocitrate dehydrogenase 2) mutations play a vital role in the development of gliomas through disruption of normal cellular metabolic processes. Here we describe a case of a patient with an IDH-mutant astrocytoma, in which both and mutations were detected within the same tumour. The patient remains disease-free, nine and a half years after her initial diagnosis.

Men's health on the web: an analysis of current resources.

Introduction: Men's health research covers a broad range of topics. Men and women face different barriers to health, with men almost universally having a lower life expectancy than women. Access to high-quality information on men's health topics is potentially an important part of engaging men with medical services.

Anti-vascular endothelial growth factor for neovascular age-related macular degeneration: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.

Background: To evaluate the relative efficacy and safety of anti-vascular endothelial growth factor (anti-VEGF) agents for the treatment of neovascular age-related macular degeneration (AMD).

Methods: Systematic literature review identifying RCTs comparing anti-VEGF agents to another treatment published before June 2016. Efficacy assessed by mean change in best corrected visual acuity (BCVA) and central macular thickness (CMT) from baseline at up to 2 years followup.

Optimal conditions required for influenza A infection-enhanced cross-priming of CD8⁺ T cells specific to cell-associated antigens.

Dendritic cells can take up exogenous tumor antigens and present their antigenic epitopes to CD8⁺ T cells (T(CD8⁺)), a process called cross-presentation. Cross-presentation is especially important in antitumor immunity because tumor cells, although carrying tumor antigens, do not activate naive T cells efficiently because of a lack of co-stimulatory molecules. Our group has recently shown that influenza A virus (IAV) infection of allogeneic cells lead to enhanced cross-priming of T(CD8⁺) specific to cellular antigens.

Influenza A infection enhances cross-priming of CD8+ T cells to cell-associated antigens in a TLR7- and type I IFN-dependent fashion.

The initiation of antitumor immunity relies on dendritic cells (DCs) to cross-present cell-associated tumor Ag to CD8(+) T cells (T(CD8+)) due to a lack of costimulatory molecules on tumor cells. Innate danger signals have been demonstrated to enhance cross-priming of T(CD8+) to soluble as well as virally encoded Ags; however, their effect on enhancing T(CD8+) cross-priming to cell genome-encoded Ags remains unknown. Furthermore, influenza A virus (IAV) has not been shown to enhance antitumor immunity.

Dynamic quantification of MHC class I-peptide presentation to CD8+ T cells via intracellular cytokine staining.

In order to further our basic understanding of antigen processing and presentation as well as to translate that knowledge into clinically effective vaccines and immunotherapies, having appropriate tools to study MHC class I-peptide presentation is highly desirable. Current methods are based upon HPLC fractionation of extracted peptides, monoclonal Ab, multivalent T cell receptors (TCR), T cell hybridomas, TCR transgenic cells, and T cell lines. However, each of these is associated with problems that make them either difficult to apply generally or too insensitive to adequately quantitate antigen presentation.