ESMO 2026: Highlights and analysis
Published on 26 October 2026
Professor Bishal Gyawali talks to ecancer about several presentations from ESMO 2026; on disease areas such as breast, GU, GI, lung and melanoma:
The presentations referred to are:
| Breast cancer | |
| Adjuvant ribociclib (RIB) + nonsteroidal aromatase inhibitor (NSAI) in patients (pts) with HR+/HER2− early breast cancer (EBC): NATALEE 6-y overall survival (OS) and efficacy outcomes | |
| Efficacy and safety of atirmociclib (ATI) + fulvestrant (FUL) in patients (pts) with HR+/HER2– advanced/metastatic breast cancer (mBC) who progressed on prior CDK4/6 inhibitor (CDK4/6i) in a randomized phase 2 study (FOURLIGHT-1) | |
| Overall survival from the phase 3 postMONARCH trial of abemaciclib + fulvestrant vs placebo + fulvestrant for HR+, HER2- advanced breast cancer following progression on a prior CDK4/6 inhibitor + endocrine therapy | |
| Results from KEYNOTE-B49: A phase 3, randomized, double-blind study of pembrolizumab (pembro) vs placebo (pbo) plus chemotherapy (CT) in participants (pts) with HR+/HER2− advanced breast cancer (ABC) | |
| GU cancers | |
| Results from a phase 3 trial of neoadjuvant (neoadj) chemotherapy alone vs in combination with nivolumab followed by postsurgical adjuvant nivolumab in patients (pts) with muscle-invasive bladder cancer (MIBC) | |
| Perioperative pembrolizumab (pembro) or placebo (pbo) + neoadjuvant cisplatin (cis) and gemcitabine (gem) in participants (pts) with muscle-invasive bladder cancer (MIBC): the double-blind, phase 3 KEYNOTE-866 study | |
| Perioperative durvalumab with or without tremelimumab plus neoadjuvant enfortumab vedotin in muscle-invasive bladder cancer: Results from the phase 3 VOLGA trial | |
| Capivasertib (capi) + abiraterone (abi) vs placebo (pbo) + abi in patients (pts) with PTEN-deficient metastatic hormone-sensitive prostate cancer (mHSPC): Updated overall survival (OS) from CAPItello-281 | |
| GI cancers | |
| Adjuvant chemotherapy with gemcitabine and cisplatin compared to standard of care after curative intent resection of cholangiocarcinoma and gallbladder carcinoma (ACTICCA-1 trial) | |
| Final overall survival results from CheckMate 8HW: Nivolumab plus ipilimumab versus nivolumab or chemotherapy in MSI-H/dMMR metastatic colorectal cancer | |
| Biweekly versus conventional trifluridine/tipiracil plus bevacizumab for refractory metastatic colorectal cancer: The pragmatic phase 3 PRABITAS trial | |
| CLARITY-Gastric 01 (CG-01): A phase 3 study of sonesitatug vedotin (Sone-Ve) in second or later-line (2L+) advanced or metastatic Claudin 18.2 (CLDN18.2)-positive gastroesophageal carcinoma (GEC) | |
| Clinical complete response with dostarlimab monotherapy in dMMR/MSI-H locally advanced rectal cancer (LARC): First results from the global registrational AZUR-1 trial | |
| Ivonescimab plus chemotherapy versus durvalumab plus chemotherapy as first-line treatment for advanced biliary tract cancer: A randomized, controlled, double-blinded, phase 3 trial (HARMONi-GI1) | |
| Lung cancer | |
| Tarlatamab plus durvalumab (durva) vs durva as 1L maintenance (1LM) therapy following durva, platinum, and etoposide (1L durva + EP) in extensive-stage small cell lung cancer (ES-SCLC): Primary analysis of the phase 3 DeLLphi-305 trial | |
| Krascendo 1: Efficacy and safety of divarasib (diva) vs sotorasib (soto) or adagrasib (ada) in previously treated locally advanced or metastatic KRAS G12C-mutated NSCLC | |
| Osimertinib (osi) + savolitinib (savo) vs platinum–pemetrexed (plat–pem) in EGFRm MET-overexpressed (OE) and/or -amplified (AMP) advanced NSCLC post-osi: SAFFRON phase (Ph) 3 primary results | |
| Pembrolizumab with or without platinum-based chemotherapy as first-line treatment in advanced NSCLC with PD-L1 ≥50%: PERSEE phase 3 trial (GFPC 01-2020) | |
| Skin cancer | |
| INTerpath-001: Phase 3 study of the mRNA-based individualized neoantigen therapy (INT) intismeran autogene (intismeran) plus pembrolizumab (pembro) vs pembro alone for adjuvant treatment of resected stage IIB-IV melanoma (MEL) | |
| STARBOARD phase 3: A randomized, double-blind study of first-line (1L) encorafenib (enco), binimetinib (bini), and pembrolizumab (pembro) vs placebo (pbo) and pembro for unresectable locally advanced or metastatic BRAF V600-mutant melanoma | |