E-Newsletter - October 2025
Spotlight on Alliance Publications
Top Journals Feature Alliance Research
From September 1, 2024, through August 31, 2025, Alliance investigators published 51 manuscripts. Of these, 31 papers (66%) appeared in journals with an Impact Factor greater than 5. Notably, six papers were published in high-impact journals with an Impact Factor over 40: two in the New England Journal of Medicine (IF 78.5), one in JAMA (IF 55), one in Nature Medicine (IF 49.2), and two in the Journal of Clinical Oncology (IF 43.4).
Adjuvant Pembrolizumab versus Observation in Muscle-Invasive Urothelial Carcinoma
Apolo, Andrea B., et al. New England Journal of Medicine 392.1 (2025): 45-55.
The Phase III AMBASSADOR trial (Alliance A031501) enrolled 702 patients. The study found that among patients with high-risk muscle-invasive urothelial carcinoma after radical surgery, disease-free survival was significantly longer with adjuvant pembrolizumab than with observation.
Phase 3 Trial of Cabozantinib to Treat Advanced Neuroendocrine Tumors
Chan, Jennifer A., et al. The New England Journal of Medicine 392.7 (2024): 653.
The Phase III CABINET trial (Alliance A021602) enrolled 203 patients. The study found that cabozantinib, as compared with placebo, significantly improved progression-free survival in patients with previously treated, progressive advanced extrapancreatic or pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors.
Active Monitoring With or Without Endocrine Therapy for Low-Risk Ductal Carcinoma In Situ
Hwang, E. Shelley, et al. JAMA 333.11 (2025): 972-980.
The COMET trial (AFT-25) enrolled 957 patients with early-stage breast cancer to compare the standard of care to watchful waiting. Women with low-risk DCIS randomized to active monitoring did not have a higher rate of invasive cancer in the same breast at 2 years compared with those randomized to guideline-concordant care (surgery with or without radiation).
Symptom Monitoring with Electronic Patient-reported Outcomes During Cancer Treatment: Final Results of the PRO-TECT Cluster-randomized Trial
Basch, Ethan, et al. Nature Medicine. (2025): 1-8.
The PRO-TECT study (AFT-39) enrolled 1,191 patients to test whether patients' outcomes and utilization of services can be improved through symptom monitoring via patient-reported outcomes between visits. The results showed that symptom monitoring with PRO meaningfully improved clinical outcomes, the patient experience and utilization of services and should be included as a standard part of clinical care.
Breastfeeding After Hormone Receptor–Positive Breast Cancer: Results From the POSITIVE Trial
Peccatori, Fedro A., et al. Journal of Clinical Oncology 43.24 (2025): 2712-2719.
In POSITIVE (Alliance A221405), two-thirds of the 313 prospectively enrolled women who gave birth after a breast cancer diagnosis breastfed, mostly for four months or more. In early follow-up, researchers did not observe differences in cancer-related events in women who breastfed compared with those who did not.
Phase II (Alliance A091802) Randomized Trial of Avelumab Plus Cetuximab Versus Avelumab Alone in Advanced Cutaneous Squamous Cell Carcinoma
Zandberg, Dan P., et al. Journal of Clinical Oncology (2025): JCO-25.
This Phase II study (Alliance A091802) enrolled 60 patients, ultimately evaluating 57. It demonstrated that the combination of avelumab and cetuximab improved progression-free survival compared to avelumab alone in patients with advanced cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma.
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