
Remembering Gerald Green, health equity and cancer research advocate
September 26, 2024
Ongoing Trial: The TMIST breast cancer screening trial has achieved its enrollment goal, paving the way for a precision approach to screening
January 16, 2025Trial Results: ECOG-ACRIN research round-up – Winter 2025

Below, we highlight several clinical trials by the ECOG-ACRIN Cancer Research Group and PrECOG. These studies were reported in the last six months, since the Summer 2024 Research Round-Up. We are featuring these studies here because they all have a high clinical impact.
Brain Cancer – A striking survival improvement for adults with slow-growing brain tumors
Common treatments for adults with grade 2 glioma include radiation and temozolomide (tem-oh·ZOL·oh·mide), which is a kind of chemotherapy in pill form. The E3F05 trial, which followed patients for more than 10 years, showed that combining temozolomide with radiation therapy resulted in a 10-year survival rate of 70%, compared to only 47% for radiation alone. This trial provides the first evidence from a randomized phase 3 trial showing that temozolomide chemotherapy enhances long-term survival for these patients. Temozolomide is a less toxic chemotherapy pill, making it easier for patients to tolerate and more manageable for oncologists to administer than other chemotherapies used for these patients. Read the press release.
Breast Cancer – Palbociclib demonstrates benefit in HR+, HER2+ metastatic disease
Approximately 10% of all breast cancers are hormone-receptor positive (HR+) and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2-positive (HER2+), often referred to as double-positive or triple-positive breast cancer. Patients with this type of breast cancer need better treatment options due to the development of resistance to current therapies. The phase 3 PATINA trial evaluated palbociclib (pal·bow·SAI·klib) as a potential treatment for these patients. Palbociclib is a targeted drug therapy already approved by the FDA to treat HR+, HER2- metastatic breast cancer. The study showed that adding palbociclib to standard anti-HER2 and endocrine therapy led to an increase in progression-free survival, with patients experiencing 44.3 months without progression versus 29.1 months for those not receiving the drug. PrECOG is among the large group of collaborators on this study co-led by Alliance Foundation Trials and Pfizer Inc. Read the press release.
DCIS Breast Cancer – Tamoxifen reduces recurrence risk for patients deemed ‘good-risk’
For patients with ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), the risk of recurrence is a key consideration when choosing therapy options after breast-conserving surgery. Current guidelines recommend considering tamoxifen post-surgery, regardless of radiation therapy. However, a patient’s individualized risk of recurrence and other factors can influence which therapy options they prefer to pursue. A study comparing outcomes in higher-risk and ‘good-risk’ DCIS patients—defined as grade 1 or 2, 2.5 cm or smaller, and having clear surgical margins of 3 mm or greater—found that tamoxifen (ta-MOX -i-fen) significantly reduced the risk of recurrence in the same breast. The estimated 15-year recurrence risk was 11.4% for those on tamoxifen compared to 19% for those who were not. This finding is from an analysis of combined data from two trials: ECOG-ACRIN E5194 and NRG/RTOG 9804. Read the press release.
Nose and Sinus Cancer – Chemotherapy helps avoid debilitating eye and bone removal
Striking results have emerged from the only prospective multi-center randomized trial to examine the effects of chemotherapy before surgery to shrink tumors and reduce the amount of normal tissue that surgeons need to remove. Surgery is required for patients diagnosed with advanced squamous cell-type cancer of the nose or sinus—but at a high physical cost. Patients enrolled in the EA3163 trial had signs that surgery would result in loss of the eye, the base of the skull bone, or both. The trial demonstrated that patients who received chemotherapy before surgery had a 50% chance of structure preservation. In contrast, patients having surgery, the usual treatment, had only a 15% chance of preserving both the eye and the base of the skull bone. Read the press release.
Mantle Cell Lymphoma – Patients may be able to safely avoid the risks of a stem cell transplant
Mantle cell lymphoma (MCL) is an incurable blood cancer more common in older men. Advances in therapies have improved patient outcomes, with remissions lasting 8-10 years or longer. Treatment options include intensive chemotherapy, immunotherapy, targeted drugs, and BTK inhibitors. Rituximab (ri-TUX-i-mab), a targeted immunotherapy drug, in one option. Patients under age 70 may also receive an autologous stem cell transplant (ASCT) if they are physically fit enough to withstand the difficult procedure, which involves high-dose chemotherapy followed by re-infusion of the patient’s own blood stem cells. However, the benefit of ASCT is debated heavily due to outdated trial data. Study EA4151 is the first randomized trial to assess ASCT for MCL patients in the current era of highly effective treatments. It was stopped early after an interim analysis found that ASCT did not improve survival for MCL patients in first complete remission with no detectable minimal residual disease (MRD). The 3-year overall survival rates were similar: 82.1% for ASCT plus rituximab versus 82.7% with rituximab alone. MRD-positive patients may still benefit from ASCT. Longer follow-up will be essential to confirm these findings. Read the press release.
For other ECOG-ACRIN study results that have been presented at major scientific meetings, visit the News and Info section of the ECOG-ACRIN website.