47th Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), Chicago, IL, USA, 3–7 June 2011

Abstract

There was much excitement at the 47th Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) and respect for patients and families who participated in the trials that were presented. The theme of the conference was patients, pathways, and progress. An estimated 35 000-40 000 oncology professionals attended.We now have a wealth of knowledge about the biology and pathology of tumors and tumor resistance, and a better understanding of the immune system and the cancer molecular pathways and targets. An exponential number of new drugs targeted to specific cancer pathway targets are becoming available or are in development. In addition, and importantly, we have increased knowledge of molecular gene expression profiling (which can aid determination of tumor aggressiveness and patient selection), predictive and prognostic biomarkers, and the necessary companion diagnostics now often needed for approval of many drugs. The future will see a multitude of tools for individualization of treatment, early detection of primary cancer, monitoring for relapse, and surveillance of specific patients at high risk of cancer development. The overriding view was that although we have come such a long way we are really only at the beginning of what will be known as 'The Genomic Era' of oncology.As for all areas of medicine, oncology data for the pediatric population are lagging behind that for adults. However, it was very reassuring that two of the six plenary session presentations were related to pediatric oncology, reinforcing the importance of and progress in this field. Furthermore, Dr Michael P. Link (the Lydia J. Lee Professor in Pediatric Cancer, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA, USA) has been elected as the ASCO President for the 2011-12 term. Although he will not be representing pediatric oncology in his role as ASCO president, his background further represents the importance that pediatric oncology has made to advances in oncology.The relative dearth of information and lack of progress in diagnosing and treating adolescents and young adults with cancer has been acknowledged and addressed by ASCO launching the Focus Under Forty Ô online education programme (http://university.asco.org/focusunder40). This programme aims to help physicians better care for patients with cancer aged 15-39 years.Some of the more notable developments in pediatric oncology presented at ASCO 2011, including the two plenary presentations mentioned above, are discussed here. Neuroblastoma High-Risk NeuroblastomaThat current practice should now be in favour of busulphan plus melphalan (BuMel) as the preferred myeloablative therapy in children with high-risk neuroblastoma was the consensus view of several pediatric oncology key opinion leaders. This is a welcome step forward for this very difficult-to-treat disease. Event-free survival (49% vs 33%) and overall survival (60% vs 48%) rates after 3 years in children with high-risk neuroblastoma were significantly higher with the combination myeloablative regimen BuMel than with a...