Oral Topotecan in Previously Treated Advanced NSCLC

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During the entire time I've been commenting on the most evidence-based and commonly used agents for previously treated patients, I've focused on taxotere, alimta, and tarceva (example in prior post here). In fact, that overlooks an agent that has actually been tested in a large study and been found to have similar activity to taxotere, but it remains pretty much an afterthought.

Racial Differences in Response to EGFR Inhibitors

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The issue of population-based differences in response to lung cancer treatments was essentially introduced with the EGFR inhibitors, so it’s appropriate to introduce racial differences overall with this work. Mention of more favorable results with EGFR inhibitors iressa and tarceva emerged with the earliest clinical studies and have since become a well established truism. Let’s explore what we know now and how we got here.

Second Line Treatment for NSCLC: Choosing Among Several Options

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Member Sandra recently asked the question that several other people have asked in one form or another: how do we choose among the treatment options for second line therapy in NSCLC. I've covered in several posts and a huge number of responses in the Q&A Forum the leading options we generally consider for second line therapy for NSCLC.

XL647: Novel Agent As An Alternative or Follow-up After Tarceva

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In the Q&A forums recently, members Jianming and Neil introduced us to the novel agent XL647, in clinical trials now, but I figured it was worth me collecting more background and providing a more thorough background. XL647 is an oral small molecular that inhibits multiple tyrosine kinases, receptors on cells that trigger cascades of activity in the cells, thereby leading to tumor development and growth.

New Trial for Smokers: Novel Chemo Agent Pralatrexate Targeting Potential Weakness for Tarceva

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I've described in a prior post and many of my comments here how tarceva and iressa, oral targeted therapies against EGFR, have been pretty consistently impressive in never-smokers. Not infallibly great, but these agents have shown high response rates in the 25-50% range for never-smokers, and have also been pretty favorable for remote and minimal smokers.

Do Patient Symptoms Correlate with Response and Survival?

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Intuitively, you'd think that people who are doing worse while getting treated for lung cancer are not going to do as well as people who have improvement in their symptoms after treatment starts. But how much do patient symptoms count in our current medical system for deciding whether a treatment is working or not, and when to move to a new therapy? The answer is that patient reported symptoms don't have a clear role yet.

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