Preface – ASCO Solid Tumor 2022

© Private – Keun-Wook Lee, MD, PhD, Department of Internal Medicine, Seoul National University College of Medicine, Seoul National University Bundang Hospital, Seongnam, South Korea

Dear Colleagues,
After 2 years of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), was held in Chicago, USA, and virtually from 3^rd–7^th June 2022. As always, the very much-anticipated event brought leading experts from across the globe together to learn and discuss the groundbreaking updates and scientific advancements which were covered in more than 2,000 abstracts, along with 85 live­stream sessions, and more than 2,500 poster presentations.

This memo inOncology issue promis­es to make for stimulating reading by offering a summary of studies investigating new agents or combinations in multiple solid tumor entities including recurrent or metastatic nasopharyngeal cancer where vast energy has been invested in developing not only effective 1L treatment options but also investigating new agents or combinations with immune checkpoint inhibitors for patients who have failed two or more lines of systemic therapy.

Moreover, innovative combinations in esophageal squamous cell carcinoma outlined in this report yield promising ­efficacy and safety, especially for those ­patients with advanced or metastatic ­disease whose overall survival was ­limited until now to less than a year after standard 1L chemotherapy.

Since the prevalence of gastric and ­gastrointestinal junction cancer (G/GEJC) increased in the last years, we are also dedicating a chapter to updated analyses and novel therapeutic options including an autologous chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy that suggests promis­ing efficacy and a manageable safety profile in previously treated patients. ­Eager awaited are results from ongoing studies with bemarituzumab, a first-­in-class monoclonal antibody against ­FGFR2b having potential to inhibit tumor pro­liferation, to change the tumor micro­environment, sensitizing it to PD-1 in­hibitors, and to enhance the antibody-dependent cellu­lar cytotoxicity.

Future treatment strategies in advanced or metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC) especially in RAS and BRAF wild-type but also in KRAS-mutated mCRC are depicted, supporting e.g. ­panitumumab plus mFOLFOX6 as 1L therapy in patients with RAS-WT and left-sided mCRC. Here, CAR-T cell therapies start to find their way into the armamentarium of treatment options, too.

Last but not least, this issue gives up-to-date clinical insights in advanced unresectable or metastatic hepatocellu­lar carcinoma with special interest on quality of life, an outcome becoming more and more important and relevant to explore.

Once again, this year’s meeting under the motto “Advancing Equitable Cancer Care Through Innovation” ­ensured that, based on the intensive ­exchange of healthcare professionals who stay at the cutting edge of research, we are getting closer to a practice that will further improve the landscape of care for patients with cancer all over the world.

© 2012 Springer-Verlag GmbH, Impressum