Latest news with #thrombocytopenia
Reuters
3 days ago
- Business
- Reuters
Health Rounds: Amgen blood platelet booster helps patients who need chemotherapy
May 30 (Reuters) - Amgen's (AMGN.O), opens new tab Nplate, which treats low blood platelet counts caused by an autoimmune condition, was highly effective at preventing a similar common and serious complication of powerful chemotherapy cancer drugs, researchers reported, opens new tab ahead of the American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting in Chicago. The 165 patients in the pivotal trial had either colorectal, gastroesophageal, or pancreatic cancer. They were all receiving toxic cancer drugs that caused them to have chemotherapy-induced thrombocytopenia – an abnormally low blood platelet count - after only a single session. A low platelet level 'puts patients with cancer at a high risk of severe or potentially fatal internal bleeding," said study leader Dr. Hanny Al-Samkari of the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. It also "impacts the ability to treat patients with the indicated chemotherapy given as it should be, at full dose and on time,' he added. Trial participants received either a weekly subcutaneous injection of Nplate, known chemically as romiplostim, or a placebo. Nplate acts by stimulating the bone marrow to increase platelet production. Of those in the Nplate group, 84% did not need any reductions of their subsequent chemotherapy doses due to a low platelet count, the researchers found. That was true for only 36% of patients in the placebo group. After taking individual risk factors into account, patients receiving Nplate were more than 10 times more likely than patients in the placebo group to continue their cancer treatments without a dose reduction. 'Reduced chemotherapy intensity has been clearly shown to worsen survival of patients... reducing the likelihood of cure in curable patients and shortening the lives of incurable patients,' Al-Samkari said. There are no FDA-approved drugs to treat chemotherapy-induced platelet loss, he noted. 'These results are therefore potentially practice‑changing for a common serious condition encountered routinely in clinical practice worldwide that prevents delivery of on-time, full-dose anti-cancer therapy,' Al-Samkari said. Artificial intelligence can improve a doctor's accuracy at identifying breast cancer patients who could benefit from treatment with drugs that target the HER2 protein on cancer cells, researchers found in a study, opens new tab that will be presented at the ASCO meeting. These drugs, including AstraZeneca's (AZN.L), opens new tab Enhertu, are beneficial even when patients' levels of the protein are extremely low. However, low or ultra-low levels can be hard to detect, leaving some patients misclassified as HER2-negative. About 50% to 60% of breast cancer patients likely fall into the low-HER2 category, according to the U.S. National Cancer Institute. Willingness to use Enhertu to treat breast cancer has far outpaced the ability to determine with certainty which patients might benefit, experts have said. Funded by AstraZeneca, researchers worked with MindPeak to develop a training program to help pathologists assess HER2 levels in breast cancer. They recruited 105 pathologists from 10 countries to take the course and to analyze tumor samples from 20 patients, both with and without AI assistance. The pathologists' accuracy at determining HER2 clinical categories - null, ultra-low, low, or positive - improved from 66.7% without AI to 88.5% with AI. Misclassification of HER2-ultralow cases as HER2-negative occurred in 29.5% of readings without AI but decreased to 4.0% with AI assistance. 'Our study provides the first multinational evidence that artificial intelligence can help enhance accuracy" in determining HER2 clinical categories, "potentially closing critical diagnostic gaps and enabling more patients to have access to new therapies, said Dr. Marina De Brot of the A.C. Camargo Cancer Center in Sao Paulo, Brazil, who led the study. 'Until recently, most of these patients would have not been offered these options,' she said. A cancer immunotherapy drug from China's BeiGene ( opens new tab used in inoperable esophageal cancer may also change the way some operable esophagus tumors are treated, a mid-stage trial suggests. When patients with newly diagnosed esophageal cancer that has begun to grow beyond its original location have completed their standard pre-operative chemotherapy, a second course of treatment that includes BeiGene's Tevimbra given before surgery can significantly improve their outcomes, researchers reported, opens new tab in advance of ASCO 2025. Researchers recruited 87 such patients whose tumors were no longer seen on imaging exams after chemotherapy with paclitaxel and carboplatin, plus radiation. Ordinarily, the next step in their care would be surgery to remove part or all of the esophagus, at which point pathologists would examine the excised tissue to see if any cancer cells remained. Cancer cells lingering after surgery contribute to the more than 50% recurrence rate in these patients, the researchers said. Half the patients in the study received two additional treatments with chemotherapy and Tevimbra, while the rest went directly to surgery. When pathologists examined the tissues removed during surgery, 40.7% of Tevimbra-treated patients were free of any lingering cancer cells, compared with 18.1% of the control group. After accounting for individual risk factors, patients in the Tevimbra group were nearly three times more likely to have what is known as a pathological complete response. One year later, 95.6% of patients in the Tevimbra group were alive without their disease worsening, known as progression-free survival, compared with 77.3% of patients who did not receive the extra treatment before surgery. That difference was not deemed to be statistically significant, however. 'This pioneering study demonstrates that sequential chemo-immunotherapy... significantly improves pathological complete response rates by more than two-fold and shows promising progression-free survival trends with manageable toxicity," the researchers said. They called for larger late-stage trials to confirm the results that could "redefine the standard-of-care.' (To receive the full newsletter in your inbox for free sign up here)
Medscape
08-05-2025
- Health
- Medscape
Fast Five Quiz: Immune Thrombocytopenia Complications
Purpura is a significant symptom of immune thrombocytopenia (ITP) and is associated with a number of complications beyond bleeding. Understanding these complications is critical as many persist even after platelet counts normalize or remission is achieved. Additionally, treatment strategies such as splenectomy or thrombopoietin receptor agonists carry their own long-term risks, making careful monitoring and management essential. What do you know about the complications of ITP? Check your knowledge with this quick quiz. Medscape © 2025 WebMD, LLC Any views expressed above are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect the views of WebMD or Medscape. Cite this: Fast Five Quiz: Immune Thrombocytopenia Complications - Medscape - May 08, 2025.
Daily Tribune
23-02-2025
- Health
- Daily Tribune
Pope suffers respiratory attack, condition critical: Vatican
Pope Francis's condition "continues to be critical", the Vatican said Saturday, saying the 88-year-old was alert but had suffered a respiratory attack that required "high-flow oxygen", and also blood transfusions. "At the moment the prognosis is reserved," it said, as the head of the Catholic Church prepared to spend his ninth night in Rome's Gemelli hospital, where he was diagnosed this week with double pneumonia. "The Holy Father's condition continues to be critical, therefore, as explained yesterday, the pope is not out of danger," the Vatican said in its regular early evening update. "This morning Pope Francis presented a prolonged asthmatic respiratory crisis, which also required the application of high-flow oxygen," it said. Daily blood tests "showed thrombocytopenia, associated with anaemia, which required the administration of blood transfusions", it added. "The Holy Father continues to be alert and spent the day in an armchair even if he was suffering more than yesterday." The Vatican earlier confirmed the Argentine pontiff would not deliver his usual weekly Angelus prayer on Sunday, saying the text would be published, as it was last weekend.
