The countdown to ESMO Congress 2019 is now on! In anticipation and celebration, VHIO Communications checked in earlier this week with our Director, ESMO and ESMO Congress President, Josep Tabernero, for pre-Congress comment:
“While our expert Congress Chairs headed by Jean-Yves Blay, Anton Berns, and Andrés Cervantes – as Scientific Committee Co-Chairs and Educational Chair, respecively- are busily finalizing this year’s scientific program, we are very much looking forward to welcoming clinicians, researchers, patient advocates, journalists and the pharmaceutical industry from all over the world to our wonderful city of Barcelona. Taking place at the Fira Congress Center, 27 September – 01 October, we will be hosting the global stage for the outing of the very latest translational cancer research, presentation of exciting practice-changing data, and the triggering of must-have multidisciplinary conversations to spur transformative therapies against cancer.”
Josep continued, “It is thanks to the superb work and dedication of all our Congress Officers and Track Chairs, including VHIO’s Ana Oaknin who is leading ESMO 2019’s Gynaecological Cancers Sub-Committee, that this year’s program continues to build on the multi-specialty scope, appeal and broad draw of meetings past. Themed ‘Translating science into better cancer patient care’, I can promise all participants the very latest advances in oncology as well as the signposting of next-steps in more rapidly translating discovery into improved outcomes for our patients.”
To find out more about what’s in store at this year’s Gynaecological Cancer Track, we then touched base with Ana Oaknin, Principal Investigator of our Gynecological Malignancies Group. Without giving too much away pre-Congress, we invited her to note down a couple educational and scientific highlights as she ‘walked’ us through the preliminary program.
Here it is, Ana’s at-a-glance Track synopsis:
ESMO 2019’s Gynaecological Cancers Track kicks-off with Saturday’s Challenge your Expert. Specifically, we will learn how the sequencing of patients with platinum-sensitive relapsed ovarian cancer is increasingly guiding treatment decisions by more accurately predicting which patients will be most likely to respond to today’s array of novel anti-cancer medicines – as single agents or in combination. We will be discussing and debating progress made in more precisely matching therapies based on the molecular make-up and specificities of each individual patient’s disease.
Our afternoon’s Educational Session will focus on just how far we have come in improving treatment approaches and outcomes for patients suffering from endometrial cancer; the sixth most commonly occurring cancer in women worldwide. Critically, with an estimated 380,000 new cases diagnosed last year alone, our panel of international experts will discuss how the molecular classification of disease has impacted on the surgical and medical approaches to treating this tumor type, culminating in the current promise and challenges of novel immuno-based agents against this disease.
Our attentions on Sunday will turn to the progress and performance of novel therapeutics against ovarian cancer. We are seeing that new cases of ovarian cancer are on the climb each year, totaling at an estimated 300,000 in 2018. While the ringing in of an increasing portfolio of approved PARP inhibitors is undoubtedly improving outcomes for many patients, several unfortunately relapse and eventually develop drug resistant disease. The afternoon’s Special symposium, will feature an outstanding panel of speakers who will report on the very latest preclinical and clinical insights, update on just how we are increasingly potentiating these therapies in order to overcome resistance, as well as identifying new biomarkers to more accurately predict which of these patients would be most likely to benefit.
Regarding novel immune-based agents, which are increasingly paired with PARPi, we will also be learning about the latest results coming out of immunotherapy trials in ovarian cancer, as well as seek to signpost next steps in better understanding why some patients respond to them and others do not. These must-have conversations will help us to collectively ensure that more patients can truly benefit from these promising treatments and novel approaches.
Monday’s Multidisciplinary session will begin with the presentation of a clinical scenario, to be explored from the perspectives of experts spanning surgery, medical oncology, and radiotherapy. Within the context of the case and beyond, we can look forward to discussion and debate on the current opportunities and challenges of standard treatment approaches for young patients suffering from early stage cervical cancer.
Cervical cancer currently ranks fourth for both incidence and mortality in women, with an increasing number of early stage cases diagnosed in patients under 35 years of age. The effects, consequences and outcomes of regimens for our younger patients can differ immensely compared with those for whom disease arises later. To seek out how we can continue work together to improve clinical outcomes for these patients by offering less invasive, more effective and less toxic strategies, our eminent speakers will elegantly explore the role of their corresponding specialties in delivering on these collective ambitions.
—
Discover so much more about this forthcoming ESMO Congress 2019 and access the very latest version of its superb Scientific Program online by visiting: https://www.esmo.org/Conferences/ESMO-Congress-2019/Programme.
###
