Top cancer researchers and physicians from all over the world flocked to Orlando for the 45th Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), held May 29th through June 2nd.

More than 4,000 abstracts were presented, many of them touching on this year's theme --"Personalizing Cancer Care."

"Many studies to be presented this year reflect advances in the new field of personalized cancer medicine, in which therapy can be targeted or avoided based on the genetics of the patient’s tumor, not just its location or stage," said Richard L. Schilsky, MD, President of ASCO and professor of medicine at the University of Chicago in an online video welcoming participants.

ASCO's Annual Meeting is one of the largest cancer-related conferences in the country; this year's event was expected to draw around 30,000 participants. Previous years have seen major announcements, including 2005's breakthrough discovery that Herceptin is effective in treating early-stage breast cancer patients.

See below for some highlights from this year's show. For more news from ASCO, check out these features from our content partners at CURE magazine.

An experimental vaccine that's used alongside interleukin-2, or IL-2, a standard treatment for melanoma, appears to kill more cancer cells than using IL-2 alone. Researchers reported promising phase III results using the combination, which shrank tumors in 22% of the patients who received it (compared to 10% for IL-2 alone). The vaccine also extended the time before the tumors started growing again. However, the trial was fairly small, and the findings are still considered preliminary.

For more information about melanoma, see our Detailed Guide.
For more information about these findings, read the abstract.

New drugs called PARP inhibitors look to have promise against triple-negative breast cancer -- cancer whose cells do not have estrogen receptors and progesterone receptors, and do not have an excess of the HER2 protein on their surfaces. Because it lacks those receptors, triple-negative breast cancer doesn't respond to hormone therapy or drugs that target HER2, such as Herceptin.

PARP inhibitors work by blocking the action of an enzyme called poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase, which helps repair DNA. Without the ability to repair their DNA, tumor cells are more vulnerable to chemotherapy.

In a study of 116 women, doctors tested one of these drugs, BSI-201, in combination with chemotherapy and found that it improved survival by more than 3 months over chemotherapy alone. A separate, smaller study tested the PARP inhibitor olaparib in women with whose breast cancers had BRCA mutations. Despite the fact that the women had already had an average of 3 chemotherapy regimens, more than a third had significant tumor shrinkage with this drug.

For more information about breast cancer, see our Detailed Guide.
For more information about these findings, read the abstracts:
http://www.abstract.asco.org/AbstView_65_33185.html
http://www.abstract.asco.org/AbstView_65_30774.html

Vaccine Appears to Slow Type of Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma

A vaccine called BiovaxID may slow the return of follicular non-Hodgkin lymphoma, a slow-growing type of blood cancer that's seen more often in older patients. In a clinical trial of 117 patients whose lymphomas went away following chemotherapy, 76 received the vaccine and 41 got a control drug. The vaccine extended the time before the lymphoma came back by more than a year.

For more information about non-Hodgkin lymphoma, see our Detailed Guide.
For more information about these findings, read the abstract.

Combo Chemo for Colon Cancer Appears to Work Differently Depending on Age

Mayo Clinic and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute scientists found that people over 70 don't appear to benefit as much as younger patients from combination chemotherapy treatment for colon cancer.

"We found that adding chemotherapy agents to the standard 5FU regimen in older patients after surgery did not provide the benefits that younger patients see," said Dan Sargent, PhD, Mayo Clinic, a collaborator on the study.

"These studies add to the knowledge base that defines how to choose treatment strategies for every individual patient," he said. "Age may become as important a consideration as tumor-specific factors when defining individual medical options for colorectal cancer patients."

For more information about colorectal cancer, see our Detailed Guide.
For more information about these findings, read the abstract.

People who were treated for cancer as children – particularly those who received radiation – have a high risk of getting other cancers later in life. However, results from the Childhood Cancer Survivor Study show that many aren't getting screened for certain cancers as adults. In fact, survivors in the study were screened less often for colorectal cancer than people in the general population. Researchers say doctors need to do a better job of educating childhood cancer survivors about their risks.

For more information about childhood cancer, see our Detailed Guide.
For more information about these findings, read the abstract.

Reviewed by: Members of the ACS Medical Content Staff