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Badges, Booths, and Buses: Welcome to ASCO 2025
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Released: May 28, 2025

Expiration: May 27, 2026

John Marshall
John Marshall, MD
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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 the academic side as well as on the corporate side.

 

I was talking to a company the other day and they were saying that a very high percentage of their business actually gets transacted while in Chicago. Not just ideas exchanged in a follow up email or a call later, but they actually do the discussion and sign on the dotted line while they're in Chicago. So, a lot more closure at ASCO than I thought. I thought it was mostly openings, if you will.

 

In one word, what does ASCO mean to me, it's community. reminds us that we are part of a huge, invested, caring global community that's focused on curing cancer, and we get together to remind ourselves every year, recharge ourselves and take that energy back so that we can make it another year doing the hard job that we do. Community.

 

 After ASCO, you definitely wanna tune back into Oncology Unscripted. We might have a couple of interviews that'll be interesting to you, but mostly we're gonna focus on the new data, the practice, transforming data that's out there that we're gonna want to, know about for everyday practice for you and your patients.

 

So, if you are a busy clinician. Maybe a generalist. Almost always the answer is 'no, I don't have time to go to ASCO.' It's not an efficient use of your time. Right. So, you would rather go on a Saturday to the best of ASCO and hear the best of, in one afternoon, one day. So, that, that's the practice changing stuff you need to take back with you. And I don't blame you one bit. I think it is the responsibility of us specialists to go to ASCO. like that and pull out all that we can pull out in our area. So, I'm not gonna go to the breast meeting and I'm not going to the lung meeting. I'm gonna focus on the GI meetings So, I can learn every little bit I can to help me be a smarter parson So, that I can help develop the next study and help those around me provide the best GI cancer care we can.

 

ASCO's a really, really special time for many of us. Usually, the weather in Chicago is pretty nice. We get a chance to meet new people that do what we do. We get a chance to check up with old people to know that, hey, you're still out there and you're doing okay, and you're making progress in the world of cancer care.

 

So, it's really an incredibly busy time. Sleep is out of the question. You just don't do it. You work all day long. You party until the wee hours, and then you get up and do it all over again, usually four days in a row. some of the busiest and hardest days of the year. But also, I would say some of the best days of the year. I can't wait to see many of you in Chicago at ASCO.