Cancer Clinical Trials in Pittsburgh, PA

This is a prospective clinical trial that will examine if biennial contrast-enhanced mammography added to annual 3D mammography (tomosynthesis) substantially improves breast cancer detection with minimal increase in false-positives, in women with a personal history of breast cancer. Read Less

After informed consent, participants will be asked to complete a medical/family history questionnaire and provide a blood sample. Some participants may also be asked to provide a urine sample. Individuals undergoing procedures that require collection of biological samples for clinical purposes may have these samples saved for research purposes. Participants will also be asked for their permission for study investigators to access medical records and/or recontact them for updates to their medical and family histories. Data and biospecimens will be stored for potential future research projects. Read Less

All subjects will receive the vaccine subcutaneously every 3 weeks x 3 with optional yearly booster vaccines up to and including 5 years post last vaccine for those patients who are confirmed responders to the vaccine . The rationale for using Poly-ICLC as an adjuvant are two ongoing trials at University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute (UPCI) of the MUC1 100mer peptide vaccine - one as a therapeutic vaccine in subjects with metastatic castrate resistant prostate cancer and the other in subjects with advanced colonic adenomas at risk for developing colon cancer. The same formulation, MUC1 100mer peptide admixed with Poly-ICLC, is used in both trials. There has been no toxicity observed and the vaccine is highly immunogenic in early disease. In the proposed NSCLC trial the anti-MUC1 immune response will be thoroughly characterized. Read Less

The goal of this Phase 1 clinical study is test tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (known as C-TIL051) with NKTR-255 and anti-PD1 therapy for subjects with refractory non-small cell lung cancer. The purpose of this study is to: 1. Test the safety and ability for subjects to tolerate the TIL therapy 2. Measure to see how the NSCLC responds to the TIL therapy Participants will be asked to: * Provide a tumor sample prior to the start of any treatment which will be used to make the C-TIL051. * Receive standard of care treatment until their lung cancer no longer responds * When necessary, the C-TIL051 will be manufactured by the sponsor and sent back to the site * Subject will then receive chemotherapy (called lymphodepletion) for 3 days followed by 2 days of rest * C-TIL051 will then be infused on day 0 followed by NKTR-255 (IL-15) about 12 to 24 hours later * Pembrolizumab will be administered every 3 weeks for up to 2 years NKTR-255 is a novel polymer-conjugated human IL-15 receptor agonist molecule designed to increase the proliferation and survival of memory CD8+ T cells and enhance the formation of long-term immunological memory which may lead to sustained anti-cancer immune response. The combination of NKTR 255 and TIL's could improve proliferation and persistence of cellular therapies leading to enhanced anti-tumor activity. Read Less

This study will assess the efficacy and safety of bilateral intra-parotid administration of AAV2-hAQP1 in adults with Grade 2 or Grade 3 radiation-induced late xerostomia. Read Less

Cancer is amongst the leading causes of disease-related morbidity and mortality. A major challenge in cancer treatment is the development of biology-informed, personalised treatment strategies. Recent advances in artificial intelligence (AI) and next-generation sequencing (NGS) technologies have shed further insights into disease biology and treatment pathways, thus identifying new, precision medicine-based therapeutic opportunities. The biological mechanisms leading to cancer development and progression arise from complex and plastic networks of dysregulated cellular programs involving many signalling pathways and effector molecules. Cancer cells alter their surrounding environment via cell-cell interactions with non-tumor cells or by secreting cytokines, chemokines and other factors. This reprogramming of the tumour microenvironment (TME) is critical for cancer progression, invasion, and metastasis. Moreover, there are increasing studies that show that both innate and adaptive immune cell types contribute to tumorigenesis and treatment resistance when present within the TME. Understanding the crosstalk between cancer cells and the surrounding TME will inform on mechanisms of sensitivity and resistance to treatment, including immunotherapy (IO) and targeted therapies. Spatially resolved-Omics is an emerging field that characterises cell types by gene/protein expressions within their spatial context in the tissue organisation. Recent high profile spatial transcriptomics studies have uncovered specific cell identities that define the surrounding TME. The MOSAIC study, a collaborative initiative across industry and top oncology hospitals, proposes to go way beyond current cancer molecular profiling projects by combining the generation and analysis of multiple data modalities (3 essential mandatory modalities: Clinical Data, Hematoxylin and Eosin (H\&E) microscopic image, Spatial transcriptomics; up to 3 high priority data modalities depending on technical feasibility and sample size: bulk Ribonucleic Acid Sequencing (RNAseq), bulk Whole Exome Sequencing (WES), Single-cell transcriptomics; and potentially other optional data modalities and follow-up experiments such as single-cell omics, immunohistochemistry and spatial proteomics or other molecular profiling of proteins and molecules) on a minimum of 2,000 tumour samples across a different cancer indications. This will generate broad molecular and cellular profiling data of the tumour and its microenvironment from cancer patients, integrated with clinical data, at an unprecedented scale and resolution. This study will enroll patients diagnosed with one of the eligible cancer indications and for which a formalin fixed paraffin embedded (FFPE) tumor sample from already performed biopsy and/or surgical resection is available within their local pathology archive or their affiliate centers archives. The MOSAIC study expects to have a strong impact for patients in terms of new targeted therapeutic drug discovery, identification of patient subgroups requiring either specific treatment or broader clinical care and identification of novel treatment response and resistance mechanisms. Read Less

This study is being done to see if anti-HER2 treatment be safely stopped in patients with HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer (MBC) that have had exceptional response to treatment. Exceptional response" is considered as cancer progression being controlled for three years or more since starting anti-HER2 treatment. Read Less

This research is being done to see if we can improve the outcome of prostate cancer patients who present with metastatic lesions at initial diagnosis. Read Less

The purpose of this research study is to evaluate the outcomes of two standard of care group exercise regimens to increase muscle mass in women who have been treated with breast cancer. Read Less

The purpose of this research study is to determine the genetic changes and immunologic changes that are involved in the development and progression of bronchogenic lung cancer. Read Less

This phase III trial studies how well standard systemic therapy with or without definitive treatment (prostate removal surgery or radiation therapy) works in treating participants with prostate cancer that has spread to other places in the body. Addition of prostate removal surgery or radiation therapy to standard systemic therapy for prostate cancer may lower the chance of the cancer growing or spreading. Read Less

This phase III trial compares the effect of adding surgery to a standard of care immunotherapy-based drug combination versus a standard of care immunotherapy-based drug combination alone in treating patients with kidney cancer that has spread to other places in the body (metastatic). Immunotherapy with monoclonal antibodies, such as nivolumab, ipilimumab, pembrolizumab, and avelumab, may help the body's immune system attack the cancer, and may interfere with the ability of tumor cells to grow and spread. Axitinib may stop the growth of tumor cells by blocking some of the enzymes needed for cell growth. Surgery to remove the kidney, called a nephrectomy, is also considered standard of care; however, doctors who treat kidney cancer do not agree on its benefits. It is not yet known if the addition of surgery to an immunotherapy-based drug combination works better than an immunotherapy-based drug combination alone in treating patients with kidney cancer. Read Less