Citations

728 Background: Adjuvant FOLFOX therapy for stage II patients remains controversial, and selection criteria are imprecise. We examined the trend of disease-free survival (DFS: time to recurrence or death, whichever occurs first); time to recurrence (TTR: time to recurrence, censored at death without recurrence); survival after recurrence (SAR); and overall survival (OS) of pts treated with FOLFOX over a ten-year period. Methods: Outcomes of pts with stage II colon cancer enrolled in 6 adjuvant trials receiving FOLFOX alone were analyzed. Pt enrollment period was dichotomized as old (1998 – 2003) vs. new era (2004 – 2009) based on the FDA approval date of bevacizumab. 3/5yr event-free rates were estimated using adjusted Kaplan-Meier methods. Outcomes were compared between the two eras by multivariate Cox model. To control for potential confounding effects, all analyses were adjusted for age, gender, performance score, T stage, number of lymph nodes (LNs) examined, tumor side, and histologic grade. Results: In total, 1,122 pts with stage II were identified; 71% and 29% were treated in the old and new era, respectively. Pts enrolled in the new era were significantly younger and more likely to have higher tumor-grade and right-sided tumors compared to old era. More pts in the new era (71%) had ≥12 LNs examined compared to the old era (53%). After adjusting for potential confounding effects, no difference in DFS, TTR, SAR or OS between old and new eras was found (Table). Although median SAR increased from 13.6 to 26 months over time, this was not statistically significant, likely due to lack of power. An increased TTR over time (HRadj. 0.41, padj.= 0.002) was observed in pts with ≥12 LNs examined (3-yr TTR: 92% in old era vs. 96% in new era), but not pts with <12 LNs examined (pinteraction = 0.04). Conclusions: In stage II colon cancer pts who received adjuvant FOLFOX, no significant increase of DFS or OS was observed over time. However TTR was longer only in pts with ≥12 LNs examined. [Table: see text]

724 Background: Adjuvant FOLFOX is the standard of care for pts with stage III colon cancer and a platform to test new agents. Improvements in supportive care and development of newer treatments for metastatic disease impact the overall outcome of pts treated with adjuvant therapy. We examined the trend of disease-free survival (DFS), survival after recurrence (SAR), and overall survival (OS) of pts treated with FOLFOX over a ten-year period. Methods: Outcomes of colon cancer pts enrolled in 6 adjuvant trials receiving FOLFOX alone were analyzed. Pt enrollment period was dichotomized as old (1998 – 2003) vs. new era (2004 – 2009) based on the FDA approval date of bevacizumab. 3/5yr event-free rates were estimated by adjusted Kaplan-Meier methods. Outcomes were compared between the two eras by Cox model. To control for potential confounding effects, all analyses were adjusted for age, gender, performance score, T/N stage, tumor sidedness and histologic grade. Results: In total, 7,230 pts (stage II [n = 1122]; stage III [n = 6,108]) were identified; 32% and 68% were treated in the old and new era, respectively. Stage III pts enrolled in the new era were significantly younger, more likely to have T4/N2 disease, higher tumor grade, and left-sided tumors. After adjusting for pt characteristics, no difference in DFS was seen over time. However prolonged SAR and OS were observed in pts treated in the new era (Table). 5yr OS increased from 76% to 80% over time. Median SAR improved from 14.8 to 26.4 months. Conclusions: Stage III colon cancer pts who received adjuvant FOLFOX experienced significant improvements in SAR and OS—but not DFS—over time. In view of the improvements in OS and nearly doubled SAR, the optimal duration of OS follow-up to evaluate the benefits of adjuvant therapy (currently 5 years) should be reassessed, and ACCENT investigators are planning to conduct these additional analyses using their large pooled-trial database. [Table: see text]

SummaryBendamustine (B) with rituximab (R) is a standard frontline treatment for medically fit follicular lymphoma (FL) patients. The safety and efficacy of maintenance rituximab (MR) after BR induction has not been formally compared to observation for FL, resulting in disparate practice patterns. Prospective trials have shown benefit of MR after R‐CHOP (rituximab, cyclophosphamide, doxorubicin, vincristine, prednisone) or R‐CVP (rituximab, cyclophosphamide, vincristine, prednisone), yet recent data from the GALLIUM study comparing outcomes of patients treated with chemotherapy with R or obinutuzumab (G) showed higher than anticipated fatal adverse events with BR/BG. In order to assess the efficacy and tolerability of MR after BR, we retrospectively collected data on 640 newly diagnosed patients treated with FL. We found that patients who achieved partial remission (PR) after ≥4 cycles of BR had improved duration of response (DOR) with MR vs. no maintenance, whereas those in complete remission did not. These findings were confirmed in a validation cohort. In the entire study population, the known fatal adverse event rate after BR was 2·5% and did not significantly differ in those receiving MR versus no maintenance. [Correction added on 14 January 2019, after online publication: The preceding sentence has been corrected in this current version.] Within the limitations inherent to retrospective analysis, these data suggest that FL patients with a PR to BR experience prolongation of remission with MR with an acceptable safety profile.

Abstract Myeloproliferative neoplasms (MPN), including polycythemia vera, essential thrombocythemia, and primary myelofibrosis, have a propensity to evolve into accelerated and blast-phase disease (MPN-AP/BP), carrying a dismal prognosis. Conventional antileukemia therapy has limited efficacy in this setting. Thus, MPN-AP/BP is an urgent unmet clinical need. Modest responses to hypomethylating agents and single-agent ruxolitinib have been reported. More recently, combination of ruxolitinib and decitabine has demonstrated synergistic in vitro activity in human and murine systems. These observations led us to conduct a phase 1 study to explore the safety of combined decitabine and dose-escalated ruxolitinib in patients with MPN-AP/BP. A total of 21 patients were accrued to this multicenter study. Ruxolitinib was administered at doses of 10, 15, 25, or 50 mg twice daily in combination with decitabine (20 mg/m2 per day for 5 days) in 28-day cycles. The maximum tolerated dose was not reached. The most common reasons for study discontinuation were toxicity/adverse events (37%) and disease progression (21%). Fourteen patients died during study treatment period or follow-up. The median overall survival for patients on study was 7.9 months (95% confidence interval, 4.1-not reached). Among evaluable patients, the overall response rate by protocol-defined criteria (complete remission with incomplete count recovery + partial remission) was 9/17 (53%) and by intention-to-treat analysis was 9/21 (42.9%). The combination of decitabine and ruxolitinib was generally well tolerated by patients with MPN-AP/BP and demonstrates potentially promising clinical activity. A phase 2 trial evaluating the efficacy of this combination regimen is ongoing within the Myeloproliferative Disorder Research Consortium.

Abstract DNA methylation is instrumental for gene regulation. Global changes in the epigenetic landscape have been recognized as a hallmark of cancer. However, the role of DNA methylation in epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC) remains unclear. In this study, high-density genetic and DNA methylation data in white blood cells from the Framingham Heart Study (N = 1,595) were used to build genetic models to predict DNA methylation levels. These prediction models were then applied to the summary statistics of a genome-wide association study (GWAS) of ovarian cancer including 22,406 EOC cases and 40,941 controls to investigate genetically predicted DNA methylation levels in association with EOC risk. Among 62,938 CpG sites investigated, genetically predicted methylation levels at 89 CpG were significantly associated with EOC risk at a Bonferroni-corrected threshold of P &lt; 7.94 × 10−7. Of them, 87 were located at GWAS-identified EOC susceptibility regions and two resided in a genomic region not previously reported to be associated with EOC risk. Integrative analyses of genetic, methylation, and gene expression data identified consistent directions of associations across 12 CpG, five genes, and EOC risk, suggesting that methylation at these 12 CpG may influence EOC risk by regulating expression of these five genes, namely MAPT, HOXB3, ABHD8, ARHGAP27, and SKAP1. We identified novel DNA methylation markers associated with EOC risk and propose that methylation at multiple CpG may affect EOC risk via regulation of gene expression. Significance: Identification of novel DNA methylation markers associated with EOC risk suggests that methylation at multiple CpG may affect EOC risk through regulation of gene expression.

Abstract Allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (allo-HCT) is a potentially curative treatment of chronic myeloid leukemia (CML). Optimal conditioning intensity for allo-HCT for CML in the era of tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) is unknown. Using the Center for International Blood and Marrow Transplant Research database, we sought to determine whether reduced-intensity/nonmyeloablative conditioning (RIC) allo-HCT and myeloablative conditioning (MAC) result in similar outcomes in CML patients. We evaluated 1395 CML allo-HCT recipients between the ages of 18 and 60 years. The disease status at transplant was divided into the following categories: chronic phase 1, chronic phase 2 or greater, and accelerated phase. Patients in blast phase at transplant and alternative donor transplants were excluded. The primary outcome was overall survival (OS) after allo-HCT. MAC (n = 1204) and RIC allo-HCT recipients (n = 191) from 2007 to 2014 were included. Patient, disease, and transplantation characteristics were similar, with a few exceptions. Multivariable analysis showed no significant difference in OS between MAC and RIC groups. In addition, leukemia-free survival and nonrelapse mortality did not differ significantly between the 2 groups. Compared with MAC, the RIC group had a higher risk of early relapse after allo-HCT (hazard ratio [HR], 1.85; P = .001). The cumulative incidence of chronic graft-versus-host disease (cGVHD) was lower with RIC than with MAC (HR, 0.77; P = .02). RIC provides similar survival and lower cGVHD compared with MAC and therefore may be a reasonable alternative to MAC for CML patients in the TKI era.