While the development of therapies designed to block “checkpoints” within the immune system has been one of the most exciting and noteworthy advances in cancer research in recent years, it’s also been one of the most puzzling, leaving researchers to ask: Why don’t these new therapies work for more patients, and why is their efficacy in controlling cancerous tumors often short-lived? A research team from Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center has shown that at least one answer — and an excellent opportunity for unleashing the full potential of these promising immunotherapies — may lie in the body’s “fight or flight” reaction to stressors and in drugs already widely used to control and temporarily disable this stress response.

Carly’s Club, an organization that raises funds for pediatric cancer research and family support programs at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center, announced today that it has rebranded as the Courage of Carly Fund.

The first study to report that overall survival was extended for patients receiving lenalidomide as maintenance treatment for multiple myeloma has been completed, with the team’s findings now published online ahead of print in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

Roswell Park Cancer Institute has been named a 2017–18 Best Hospital for cancer by U.S. News & World Report. The Buffalo, N.Y., comprehensive cancer center was ranked by the news outlet as 33rd among nearly 900 cancer hospitals reviewed nationwide, and was also recognized as high-performing within two other categories: urology and lung cancer surgery.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has awarded orphan drug status to a promising immunotherapy vaccine developed at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center. The FDA notified MimiVax LLC, a Roswell Park spinoff company, on Aug. 3 that its application for orphan status for SurVaxM as treatment for glioblastoma, a type of brain cancer, had been approved.