Oncology Unscripted With John Marshall: Episode 17: Badges, Booths, and Buses: Welcome to ASCO 2025

Badges, Booths, and Buses: Welcome to ASCO 2025

John Marshall, MD: John Marshall Oncology Unscripted. You know what this is? Yeah. You know what this is. This is my ASCO badge. It is that time of year again where I. I don't know, 40, 50, 60,000 of us and our closest friends all fly up to Chicago, stay in hotels that are overpriced, get bused around downtown Chicago, even on Saturday and Sunday. We get in nice clothes. We go to the convention center. We probably share a virus or two, but we mostly share important new information around the world of cancer. Maybe the most important cancer meeting there is on an annual basis, both from a social but also professional level do we gather to really exchange ideas and hear what's happening out there in the world Now. I also in my badge, got this, a 30-year member, God. know what that means? I got one also called ASCO Ambassador. I'm not even really sure what that means. Maybe I owe 'em money. I don't, I don't know what that's all about. I got my thing that I'm gonna submit to win whatever it is they're giving out, this year at ASCO. So, I've got all my equipment, I'm ready to go.

Titles of the abstracts have been released, and there's a lot of really cool information. I know we've been kind of having a sub-theme around pancreatic cancer, last few episodes and during the oral presentations, there are three very important, probably practice changing abstracts around pancreatic cancer, around perioperative treatment for resectable pancreas, cancers, novel therapies that are being brought to the table for pancreas cancer. So, whether you're going or not, you need to know what happened at ASCO. And so, stay tuned because we're also going to be broadcasting from the meeting, and we'll of course follow up with some of the key data post ASCO. 

Now, most of us, when we think about ASCO, we start with what are the plenary papers this year? And there are five. Two of the five happen to be GI. That's, that's a record. I think for us. Normally it's all breast and then maybe something else. But two of these five are in fact, GI cancers. One is around immunotherapy in the perioperative setting of gastric cancer. Gotta be positive. It's why it's in the plenary session. The other is not news in some way, but, God, if it had been negative, we would really need to rethink things. It's using IO therapy in the adjuvant setting for MSI, high mismatch repair deficient colon cancer. Important study around head and neck and immunotherapy. So, big, continued theme around immunotherapy, incorporation, some targeted therapy in breast cancer. Again, positive. Yet another positive breast cancer study, and the last is around polycythemia vera. Have to kind of throw something to the heme team there. So, it looks like a very interesting year for new data and new research.

But if you are thinking about ASCO, I mean. Will people be going? The United States is not the favorite place to be, particularly if you're from another country right now, a huge number of people usually come from around the world. I'll be interested to see do they decide to come, or do they decide to stay home because they're concerned about being in the US and feeling vulnerable at a time when nobody wants to feel vulnerable.

Have you ever been to ASCO? It's a zoo. It's a huge convention center, like I say, 40, 50,000 people that are there. But you keep crossing people that like, you know, we did fellowship together, or I know you, you're a friend of mine. Let's stop and talk for a second. Or let's just wave at each other and remember that each other still exists. It's a wonderful experience and if you've never been. You should absolutely go. If you've been every year for the last 30 years like me, then you're eager to go back and see all of your friends and show off your new comfortable shoes and your new tie.

ASCO has become more commercial. If you've ever been in the big area, the booth area where all the displays are, they're just remarkable and they have to be divided by US and EX-US because of the different rules. Although still, I've never seen one as quite as good as one I saw early on in my career where they actually had a flowing fountain of water through the entire exhibit. because it was a medicine to help dry mouth and so this water was going to improve your overall feeling, this water in the desert, if you will. I don't even think that drug actually ever really stuck around. But, anyway, they had the best booth, the most remarkable booth that I have ever seen, but it's still pretty commercial, pretty crowded. A lot of people crosstalk on t