Impact of Pharmacist-Led Patient Education in an Ambulatory Cancer Center: A Pilot Quality Improvement Project.

INTRODUCTION: Although pharmacist-driven patient education has been shown to increase adherence, reduce medication errors, and lower 30-day readmission rates, the data in the ambulatory oncology setting is limited. This pilot quality initiative study was conducted from June 1, 2018, to November 15, 2018, in the ambulatory cancer center affiliated with The Mount Sinai Hospital in New York, NY, to determine the impact of pharmacist counseling on chemotherapy regimens. METHODS AND MATERIALS: English-speaking patients with gastrointestinal malignancies who were newly started on chemotherapy were selected for this study. They received a pharmacist-led education session regarding their medications, potential side effects, and how to manage them at home. After each session, they completed a 5-question survey on a 5-point Likert-scale about how they felt before and after speaking with a pharmacist. Survey results were analyzed by median scores and Wilcoxon signed-rank test. RESULTS: Of the 96 patients who were counseled, 71 patients were included in this analysis. The median score increased from 3 to 5 for the understanding of their chemotherapy regimen and side effects (questions 1 and 2), 3 to 4.5 for knowledge about interactions with their oral chemotherapy (question 3), 4 to 5 for overall experience in the cancer center (question 5). The median score for anxiety level was unchanged at 3 (question 4). CONCLUSION: This survey-based study demonstrated the benefit of a pharmacist-led counseling session. An interdisciplinary approach involving the integration of oncology pharmacists in patient education can greatly impact the quality of care for oncology patients.

A Drosophila platform identifies a novel, personalized therapy for a patient with adenoid cystic carcinoma.

Adenoid cystic carcinoma (ACC) is a rare cancer type that originates in the salivary glands. Tumors commonly invade along nerve tracks in the head and neck, making surgery challenging. Follow-up treatments for recurrence or metastasis including chemotherapy and targeted therapies have shown limited efficacy, emphasizing the need for new therapies. Here, we report a Drosophila-based therapeutic approach for a patient with advanced ACC disease. A patient-specific Drosophila transgenic line was developed to model the five major variants associated with the patient's disease. Robotics-based screening identified a three-drug cocktail-vorinostat, pindolol, tofacitinib-that rescued transgene-mediated lethality in the Drosophila patient-specific line. Patient treatment led to a sustained stabilization and a partial metabolic response of 12 months. Subsequent resistance was associated with new genomic amplifications and deletions. Given the lack of options for patients with ACC, our data suggest that this approach may prove useful for identifying novel therapeutic candidates.

A personalized platform identifies trametinib plus zoledronate for a patient with KRAS-mutant metastatic colorectal cancer.

Colorectal cancer remains a leading source of cancer mortality worldwide. Initial response is often followed by emergent resistance that is poorly responsive to targeted therapies, reflecting currently undruggable cancer drivers such as KRAS and overall genomic complexity. Here, we report a novel approach to developing a personalized therapy for a patient with treatment-resistant metastatic KRAS-mutant colorectal cancer. An extensive genomic analysis of the tumor's genomic landscape identified nine key drivers. A transgenic model that altered orthologs of these nine genes in the Drosophila hindgut was developed; a robotics-based screen using this platform identified trametinib plus zoledronate as a candidate treatment combination. Treating the patient led to a significant response: Target and nontarget lesions displayed a strong partial response and remained stable for 11 months. By addressing a disease's genomic complexity, this personalized approach may provide an alternative treatment option for recalcitrant disease such as KRAS-mutant colorectal cancer.

A case of syngeneic graft-versus-host disease.

Graft-versus-host disease has been reported to occur rarely in syngeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplant recipients. Clinical and histological changes consistent with graft-versus-host disease have been reported to occur in this patient population. We report a case of a 46-year-old Caucasian male with diffuse large B-cell lymphoma in complete remission who underwent a syngeneic hematopoietic stem cell transplant. He was diagnosed with grade III acute skin and gastrointestinal graft-versus-host disease requiring high-dose corticosteroids and immunosuppressive therapy and resulting in a complete response. Syngeneic graft-versus-host disease is an anomaly that needs to be considered as a differential diagnosis of patients experiencing dermatitis, gastroenteritis, or hepatitis after an identical twin hematopoietic stem cell transplant.

A single-center, retrospective analysis to compare the efficacy and safety of filgrastim-sndz to filgrastim for prophylaxis of chemotherapy-induced neutropenia and for neutrophil recovery following autologous stem cell transplantation.

Filgrastim-sndz (Zarxio®) was approved by the FDA in March 2015 as a biosimilar product of its reference product, filgrastim (Neupogen®) for all five indications. The NCCN Clinical Practice Guidelines has incorporated filgrastim-sndz into its recommendations as a category 1 recommendation for use in settings of febrile neutropenia, myelosuppressive chemotherapy administration, and post-hematopoietic stem cell transplant (HSCT). As a cost-saving initiative, our institution switched from filgrastim to filgrastim-sndz for all indications starting in March 2016. The purpose of this study was to assess for any difference in clinical or safety outcomes between filgrastim and filgrastim-sndz. This is an IRB-approved, single institution, 1-year retrospective chart review (September 2015 to August 2016) conducted in hospitalized adults who received either filgrastim or filgrastim-sndz either for prophylaxis of chemotherapy-induced myelosuppression or for neutrophil recovery after autologous HSCT. Our data showed no differences in duration of G-CSF therapy (7.96 vs. 8.5 days, P = 0.36), white blood count (WBC) (8.99 vs. 8.04, P = 0.28), absolute neutrophil count (ANC) (7.62 vs. 6.91 × 109/L, P = 0.36) at the time of granulocyte-colony stimulating factor (G-CSF) discontinuation, or safety of filgrastim and filgrastim-sndz. The efficacy and safety of filgrastim and filgrastim-sndz were similar for prophylaxis of chemotherapy-induced neutropenia and neutrophil recovery post-autologous HSCT.

Development of Bell's Palsy After Treatment With Ipilimumab and Nivolumab for Metastatic Melanoma: A Case Report.

Ipilimumab is a human monoclonal antibody that targets cytotoxic T-lymphocyte-associated antigen 4 (CTLA-4), and it is FDA approved for the treatment of unresectable or metastatic melanoma. Immune-related adverse events (irAEs) of gastrointestinal, dermatologic, and endocrine origin are commonly seen, ranging between 18% and 44%, with immune checkpoint inhibitors (anti-CTLA-4 and anti-PD-1/PD-L1). Rare irAEs include neurological, renal, and hematologic toxicities. Bell's palsy is a form of neurological toxicity that presents as an idiopathic paralysis of the muscles on one side of the face. We report a case of Bell's palsy in a 45-year-old male patient who received 1 dose of both ipilimumab and nivolumab for the treatment of metastatic melanoma. After the resolution of symptoms, ipilimumab was permanently discontinued and single-agent nivolumab administered. The patient has remained free of neurological symptoms. This case suggests that Bell's palsy is an irAE induced by ipilimumab.

Hematopoietic stem cell transplant-associated thrombotic microangiopathy: review of pharmacologic treatment options.

BACKGROUND: Transplant-associated thrombotic microangiopathy (TA-TMA) is a multifactorial disorder, which occurs as a result of treatment-related endothelial injury and underlying disease process after hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT). The reported incidence of TA-TMA after HSCT is 0% to 74% and has shown to be associated with mortality rate of up to 100%. TA-TMA is often diagnosed late in the disease progression, and therapeutic plasma exchange (TPE) has not been shown to produce a high response rate. STUDY DESIGN AND METHODS: All English-language articles describing pharmacologic treatments for TA-TMA were identified using Ovid in the Medline database (1966-May 2014). Search was limited to the HSCT population. RESULTS: Approximately 50% to 63% of patients with TA-TMA respond to withdrawal of the offending agent (calcineurin inhibitors) and TPE, and many will require additional treatment to better control the disease. Unfortunately, there is no established treatment strategy for TA-TMA. A number of pharmacologic agents that have been explored for the treatment of TA-TMA include rituximab, vincristine, defibrotide, pravastatin, and eculizumab. The overall response rates of these agents were similar (69%-80%); however, the differences in the treatment costs vary significantly between these agents. Defibrotide is an investigational agent in the United States; therefore, it is not readily available for use. CONCLUSION: Larger studies are warranted to validate the role of these pharmacologic agents in TA-TMA as upfront therapy and in TPE-refractory patients. Recently suggested predictive biomarkers for TA-TMA, such as neutrophil extracellular traps and circulating endothelial cells, deserve more attention in future studies.