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Breast cancer (BC) is the second most diagnosed cancer in 2018 with around 2.3 million cases globally in 2020. In March 2020 and after its worldwide spread, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak, a respiratory disease caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) virus, a pandemic. During this time, cancer patients were heavily impacted and their treatment plans were changed due to measures to fight the disease and solutions had to be found to maintain their follow-up and management from a distance. Some cancer groups worldwide have recommended then the use of telemedicine for oncology patients to ensure the continuity of medical care during the pandemic. This method was considered effective and clinicians worldwide continued using telehealth even after the cessation of worldwide restrictions. To this end, current up-to-date data on the use of telemedicine in BC patient after the COVID-19 outbreak are summarized in this narrative review.

PURPOSE: Sunitinib offers improved efficacy for patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC). To provide better disease management in the Middle East, we studied its use in mRCC in real-life practice in this region. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Patients diagnosed with mRCC and started on sunitinib between 2006 and 2016 from 10 centers in Africa and the Middle East region were studied in this regional, multicenter, observational, retrospective trial to obtain routine clinical practice data on the usage patterns and outcomes of sunitinib in mRCC in real-life practice. RESULTS: A total of 289 patients were enrolled. Median age at diagnosis was 58.7 years. The patient characteristics were as follows: 73.6% of patients were males; 85.8% had clear-cell renal cell carcinoma (RCC); 97.5% had unilateral RCC; 66.3% had metastatic disease at initial diagnosis; 56.3% received previous treatment for RCC, among which 98.7% had undergone surgery; and 15.2% and 31.4% were classified in the favorable and poor-risk groups (expanded Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center criteria), respectively. On treatment initiation, the mean total sunitinib dose was 48.1 mg, and 87.6% of patients were started on a sunitinib dose of 50 mg. The mean duration of sunitinib treatment was 9.6 months. Overall response rate was 20.8%, with a median duration of 8.2 months. Median time to progression was 5.7 months. Median follow-up time was 7.8 months. By months 12 and 24, 34.3% and 11.4% of patients, respectively, were still alive. Seventy-six patients (60.9%) experienced 314 adverse events. Twenty-three patients (8.0%) experienced 28 serious adverse events. Overall, 83 patients (28.7%) discontinued their sunitinib treatment. CONCLUSION: The results are indicative of the general treatment outcomes of patients with mRCC in the Middle East using sunitinib in routine clinical practice. Reported adverse events are similar to those described in the literature but at lower frequencies.

Stage III non-small cell lung cancer is a border line stage between localized and metastatic disease. PDL-1 is gaining an important role in the therapeutic arsenal of lung cancer, the most frequent cancer worldwide. We report for the first time a negativation of PDL-1 status in 2 cases of stage IIIA NSCLC with conversion to operable disease after using immunotherapy. The first patient was a 59-year old female diagnosed incidentally to have stage IIIA inoperable NSCLC that was treated with combination chemo-immunotherapy, and converted to operable disease with a negative PD-L1 in the postoperative setting. The second case is that of a 56-year old male that also had an inoperable stage IIIA NSCLC treated with chemotherapy first line followed by pembrolizumab at progression, then operated after surgical conversion, with negative PD-L1 postoperatively. In front of these findings, further work should be done to elucidate if the reverse of the PDL-1 status and the conversion to operability were due to the use of immunotherapy or to an incidental finding. If confirmed, it may have a therapeutic impact.

Aim: Report the epidemiologic and histologic characteristics of CNS lesions in the Lebanese population. Methods: We conducted a retrospective study evaluating 2025 CNS lesions diagnosed between 1998 and 2017 in the pathology laboratory of a Lebanese tertiary center. Results: 52.2% of patients were men with a median age of 50 years. The most frequent symptoms were epilepsy (22.5%), headache (20.6%) and motor impairment (19.9%). 90.7% of tumors were primary. Lung (35.6%) and breast (16.5%) were the most frequent primaries of metastases. 46.2% of primary CNS tumors were glial, predominantly astrocytic (56.4%), and (42.5%) were nonglial, predominantly meningeal tumors (58%). Conclusion: Compared with Western literature, the Lebanese population is characterized by a younger age of onset of brain tumors, a lower rate of meningiomas and a higher rate of gliomas.