Virginia Powers, PhD

Articles by Virginia Powers, PhD

Significant activity was observed when ibrutinib was administered concurrently with CD19-directed CAR T-cell therapy compared with separately in patients with high-risk relapsed/refractory chronic lymphocytic leukemia who had progressed on or were intolerant of ibrutinib. Data presented at the 15th International Conference on Malignant Lymphoma show a high response rate with this concurrent treatment. 

Patients with advanced alveolar soft part sarcoma demonstrated durable responses that occurred early following the initiation of atezolizumab, according to phase II trial findings presented at the 2018 CTOS Annual Meeting. Atezolizumab was also well tolerated and demonstrated a favorable safety profile.

Avapritinib showed substantial clinical activity in patients with gastrointestinal stromal tumors with <em>KIT</em> and <em>PDGFRA</em> mutations, according to findings from the phase I NAVIGATOR trial presented at the 2018 CTOS Annual Meeting. To date, patients with GIST who harbor these mutations have typically been resistant to all available therapies.

According to long-term follow-up data from the phase III CLL11 study, treatment with obinutuzumab combined with chlorambucil&nbsp;reduced the risk of death by 24% versus rituximab plus chlorambucil in treatment-na&iuml;ve patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia with comorbidities. These findings were presented&nbsp;at the 2018 European Hematology Association Congress.

Similar improvements in quality of life were found with frontline treatment of osimertinib for patients with&nbsp;advanced&nbsp;EGFR-mutant non&ndash;small cell lung cancer, as well as&nbsp;a clinically meaningful improvement in cough, compared with the standard-of-care EGFR TKIs, according to the phase III FLAURA trial. The results were presented at the 2018 European Lung Cancer Congress&nbsp;in Geneva, Switzerland.

Although the addition of pazopanib (Votrient) to gemcitabine in the second-line treatment of&nbsp;patients with metastatic or relapsed uterine or soft tissue leiomyosarcomas demonstrated disease control in the majority of patients,&nbsp;statistical endpoints were not met in the&nbsp;phase II UNICANCER SARCOMA 11 study, according to results reported at the 2017 ESMO Congress.