OncTimes Talk Research Review February 2022: Dr. Stephen Hahn, COVID, 2021 World Cancer Leaders’ Summit & Cervical Cancer News

Today we are bringing you a round up of three stories from around the world. We will start at the 2021 World Cancer Leader’s Summit, then move onto a story on how radiotherapy can cut late gastrointestinal toxicity for cervical cancer patients, and finish with lessons on what COVID has taught us about cancer care. All interviews are brought to you by journalist Peter Goodwin.

First up, we hear from radiation oncologist Stephen Hahn, MD, who was the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's Commissioner from 2019 to 2021—where he oversaw all manner of regulations concerning COVID-19 vaccines and therapeutics. In his 2021 address at the World Cancer Leaders' Summit, Hahn discussed "What can we learn from the development of COVID-19 vaccines." During the summit, leading cancer decision-makers from about a hundred countries met online to assess whether innovations generated during the pandemic of COVID-19 could be harnessed to improve cancer treatment and prevention. Journalist Peter Goodwin was curious to know about decision-making at the FDA during this crucial period of American history.

Next, from Mumbai, India—there's news that the new adjuvant radiotherapy standard of care for cervical cancer—image-guided intensity-modulated radiotherapy (IG-IMRT)—should cut late gastrointestinal (GI) toxicity rates by 50 percent. This according to mature results from the Phase III, randomized Postoperative Adjuvant Radiation in Cervical Cancer (PARCER) study.

Although IG-IMRT is a newer—more costly—form of radiotherapy that has already been shown to reduce early toxicity rates to some extent when compared with conventional three-dimensional conformal radiation therapy (3D-CRT), up until now it had not been shown to outperform the older technique either in terms of medium-term toxicity or anti-cancer activity.

The PARCER findings, however, demonstrate clear superiority for long term GI toxicity. They confirm equivalent anti-neoplastic efficacy.

Peter Goodwin interviewed first author Supriya Chopra MD, DNB, from the Tata Memorial Centre’s Homi Bhabha National Institute in Kharghar near Mumbai, India. She discusses the strong mandate that the study has brought for choosing IG-IMRT adjuvant radiotherapy for patients with early cervical cancer in whom surgery is needed.

Lastly, The COVID-19 pandemic has taught us a lot about cancer care—according to one of India's most prominent oncologists, C.S. Pramesh, MS FRCS, Director of the Tata Memorial Centre in Mumbai, India. He also spoke at the 2021 World Cancer Leaders’ Summit, organized by the Union for International Cancer Control, and hosted virtually by the American Society for Clinical Pathology. After the meeting OncTimes Talk reporter Peter Goodwin caught up with him to ask for his take on the impact the pandemic has had on cancer medicine, and about his views on how to improve medical practice and cope better with future crises.