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High mortality has been observed in the cancer population affected with COVID-19 during this pandemic. We undertook this study to determine the characteristics and outcomes of cancer patients with COVID-19 and assessed the factors predicting outcome.Patients of all age groups with a proven history of malignancy and a recent diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 infection based on nasal/nasopharyngeal reverse transcriptase (RT)-PCR tests were included. Demographic, clinical and laboratory variables were compared between survivors and non-survivors groups, with respect to observed mortality.Between May 11 and August 10, 2020, 134 patients were included from the three centres and observed mortality was 17.1 per cent. The median age was 53 yr (interquartile range 39-61 yr) and thirty four patients (25%) were asymptomatic. Solid tumours accounted for 69.1 per cent and breast cancer was the most common tumour type (20%). One hundred and five patients (70.5%) had received chemotherapy within the past four weeks and 25 patients (19.3%) had neutropenia at presentation. On multivariate analysis, age [odds ratio (OR) 7.99 (95% confidence interval [CI] 1.18-54.00); P=0.033], haemoglobin [OR 6.28 (95% CI 1.07-37.04); P=0.042] neutrophil-lymphocyte ratio [OR 12.02 (95% CI 2.08-69.51); P=0.005] and baseline serum albumin [OR 18.52 (95% CI 2.80-122.27); P=0.002], were associated with higher mortality. Recent chemotherapy, haematological tumours type and baseline neutropenia did not affect the outcome.Higher mortality in moderate and severe infections was associated with baseline organ dysfunction and elderly age. Significant proportion of patients were asymptomatic and might remain undetected.

Introduction Soft tissue sarcoma(STS) is a rare and heterogeneous group of disorders with dismal outcomes in metastatic setting. Pazopanib and oral metronomic chemotherapy (OMT) have been evaluated as therapeutic options in this cohort. Materials and methods We conducted a retrospective, single center study evaluating 45 patients with unresectable and/or metastatic STS, who received pazopanib or oral metronomic regimen as per instituitonal protocol between January 2013 and December 2019. An informal cost minimisation analysis was conducted for both OMT and pazopanib arms, considering equivalent outcomes for both (PFS and OS). Results Median PFS in OMT and Pazopanib groups was 4.13 months and 3.53 months,respectively (HR1.31, 95% CI:0.68–2.51, p = 0.41) Only one patient in the OMT group achieved an objective response (partial response) and no objective response was noted in the pazopanib group. The incidence of grade III/IVtoxicities was higher with pazopanib than with OMT (p = 0.08). There were no toxicity related deaths noted in either arm. Conclusions Our study demonstrates that OMT have a similar progression free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) in metastatic STS. This study raises the possibility that OMT might be an equally efficacious and less toxic alternative to pazopanib, without compromising survival outcome especially in LMIC.

ObjectivesDexamethasone sparing strategies have shown success. The feasibility of a dexamethasone-free antiemetic strategy remains undetermined. A prospective, single-arm, pilot study was planned to determine the efficacy of an olanzapine-based, dexamethasone-free, three-drug antiemetic regimen.MethodsChemotherapy naïve, adult patients (≥18 years) who received ondansetron, aprepitant and olanzapine during the first cycle of highly emetogenic chemotherapy were enrolled. The primary endpoint was the rate of complete response (CR: no vomiting and no use of rescue medications) during the overall period (0–120 hours).ResultsOut of the total of 101 patients enrolled, most were women (82%) and received anthracycline cyclophosphamide (73%) combination therapy. The rate of CR for the overall period was 65% (95% CI 55.2% to 74.5%). The rate of CR for the acute and delayed period was 79% (95% CI 70% to 86.7%) and 76% (95% CI 66.7% to 84.1%). The rate of nausea control rates for the acute, delayed and overall periods were 34%, 29% and 24%, respectively. The grade I, II and III sedation rates over the 5 days were 8%, 5% and 1%, respectively.ConclusionsThe dexamethasone-free antiemetic strategy showed modest efficacy with low incidence of clinically significant somnolence. There is a need to prospectively investigate the role of dexamethasone in the era of newer potent antiemetics in a randomised fashion.Trial registration numberCTRI/2021/07/034813.

Background Uncommon histopathological subtypes account for less than 5% cases of soft tissue sarcoma (STS) and unclassified STSs comprise another 16%, these are often chemotherapy-resistant, with a dismal outcome in unresectable/metastatic disease. Prospective studies on the use of pazopanib in this cohort of patients are lacking in the literature. Here, we describe the safety and efficacy of pazopanib in rare histologies of advanced STS. Materials and methods We conducted a retrospective study at two tertiary cancer centres in India, evaluating 33 cases of rare subtypes of STS, who received pazopanib as per institutional protocol between January 2013 and December 2019. Patients who received pazopanib for unresectable/metastatic disease were enrolled in this study for clinicopathologic features, treatment outcome and evaluation of prognostic factors. Results Out of 33 patients, there were seven cases of undifferentiated pleomorphic sarcoma, four cases each of myxofibrosarcoma, epithelioid sarcoma and malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumour, three cases each of haemangiopericytoma and spindle cell sarcoma, two cases of haemangioendothelioma and a case each of clear cell sarcoma, retroperitoneal sarcoma, angiosarcoma and pleomorphic rhabdomyosarcoma-adult type. The objective response rate was 27%. Most of the patients (67%) received pazopanib in second or subsequent lines of therapy. The majority (70%) were started at a lower dose of 400/600 mg and only 43% of these (10/23) could be escalated to a full dose of 800 mg based on tolerance. On univariate analysis, pazopanib's starting dose didn't predict progression-free survival (PFS)/overall survival (OS)/response rate. At a median duration of follow-up of 18.8 months (range 1.9-150.4 months), the median PFS and median OS were 10.3 months (95% confidence interval (CI): 5.9-14.8) and 17.8 months (95% CI: 10.7-29.3), respectively. 27% of the patients experienced grade ¾ toxicities, 12% required dose modification of pazopanib and 21% needed permanent discontinuation due to toxicity. Conclusion Our study shows that pazopanib is active in rare subtypes of STS.

Maintenance chemotherapy (MC) with pemetrexed is a commonly used strategy in nonsquamous non-small cell lung cancer. However, most of the available evidence is from subjects with good performance status (PS), while data on the real-world utility and safety of this strategy in subjects with various categories of PS is limited. We performed a retrospective analysis of multicentric data of 3 centers from India. All patients with advanced nonsquamous non-small cell lung cancer who received MC with pemetrexed after induction chemotherapy were included. Subjects were divided into 2 groups based on baseline Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group score before initiation of induction chemotherapy as good PS (2) and poor PS (≥2). Progression-free survival, overall survival, and toxicity were assessed in the study population. A total of 290 subjects were included in the study, of whom a significant proportion (n = 104, 35.9%) had poor PS. Survival was better in subjects with good PS as compared to those with poor PS (1-year progression-free survival: 43.5% vs 29.8%, P = 0.021; 1-year overall survival: 61.8% vs 48.1%, P = 0.023). Grade 3/4 toxicity was observed in 14.5% of subjects during MC and was not different between both groups (P = 0.287). Renal dysfunction was more common in subjects who received ≥10 cycles of MC (10.7% vs 4.2%, P = 0.040). MC with pemetrexed appeared to be beneficial and safe in the real-world setting regardless of the baseline PS. However, survival benefit was more pronounced in subjects with good PS at baseline. Renal dysfunction was more frequently encountered in subjects who received prolonged MC.

The development of acute myeloid leukemia has been attributed to various factors, including hereditary, radiation, drugs, and certain occupational exposures. The association between malignancy and venous thromboembolism events is well established. Here, we present a case of a 70-year-old Indian man who had presented with arterial and venous thrombosis, and the patient was later diagnosed with acute promyelocytic leukemia (APL). In our case, the patient presented with right lower limb deep venous thrombosis and pulmonary thromboembolism four months prior to the diagnosis of APL. Although thromboembolic event subsequent to the diagnosis of malignancy, and especially during the chemotherapy has been widely reported, this prior presentation with simultaneous occurrence of both venous and arterial thromboembolism has rarely been reported. We take this opportunity to state the significance of a complete medical evaluation in cases of recurrent or unusual thrombotic events.

Background & objectives: Survival of patients with multiple myeloma (MM) has improved in the past two decades following use of novel agents and autologous stem cell transplantation. To determine predictors of long-term outcome, data of MM patients who underwent autologous stem cell transplantation (ASCT) at a tertiary care centre in north India were retrospectively analyzed. Methods: Between 1995 and 2016, 349 MM patients underwent ASCT. Patients' median age was 52 yr, ranging from 29 to 68 yr, 68.2 per cent were males. Thirty three per cent patients had international staging system (ISS) Stage III and 68.5 per cent had received novel agents-based induction. High-dose melphalan (200 mg/m2) was used for conditioning; patients with renal insufficiency (estimated glomerular filtration rate

11064 Background: Reaching to the correct histo-pathological diagnosis of soft tissue sarcomas (STS) is a great challenge and is cornerstone for treatment planning. Need of expertise for diagnosis is limited by lack of expert pathologists and dedicated sarcoma oncologists in India. Through this study we highlight the pattern of pathological diagnosis and accuracy outside specialist centre. Methods: We did retrospective analysis of all patients referred to us with diagnosis of STS in the last 12 months (January 2016 to 2017). According to protocol, all patients had pathology review from our institute. If blocks were available then they were reviewed and if necessary, fresh biopsy was performed. Besides, pathological diagnosis was reviewed in joint clinic, giving clinico-radiological inputs to sarcoma pathologists. For patients diagnosed outside and had discordant report, we divided them into major discrepancy (including change of diagnosis of sarcoma to benign or other histological entity that could potentially change the treatment plan) or minor discrepancy (like mild change in grade or histopathological diagnosis not affecting the treatment plan). Results: There were 149 patients registered with median age of 36 years (14-77 years) and 93 patients (62.4%) were males. 85(57%) patients had localized disease. Most common subtypes were synovial sarcoma 16%, liposarcoma 9%, soft tissue ewings sarcoma 9%, MPNST 9%, leiomyosarcoma 8%, pleomorphic undifferentiated sarcoma 8% etc. Of 149 patients, 42 had not been worked up outside and thus comparison was not possible while 4 patients couldn’t retrieve blocks and repeat biopsy could not be performed. Of 97 patients (biopsy = 84, FNAC = 13) who had diagnosis from outside, 37% had major discrepancy and 24% had minor discrepancy compared with our biopsy review. Major discrepancy was more in non extremity than extremity STS (p = 0.003). Conclusions: Pathological diagnosis of more than half of patients referred from outside was discordant with respect to diagnosis of our centre with major implications on 37%. We believe this is due to lack of sarcoma pathology experts and virtually non-existent multidisciplinary clinics in set up outside tertiary care centres.