Tag Archives: access

More breast cancer patients opting for mastectomy — ScienceDaily

The rates of increase were steepest among women with lymph node-negative and in situ (contained) disease. This is a reversal of trends seen since the 1990s when breast conservation surgery (BCS) was found to produce equivalent cancer outcomes and was endorsed as a standard of excellence by a National Institutes of Health Consensus Conference. The Vanderbilt University study, led by Kristy Kummerow, M.D., and Mary Hooks, M.D., MBA, was published online in the Nov. …

Possibilities for personalized vaccines — ScienceDaily

“One of the biggest hurdles in cancer immunotherapy is the discovery of appropriate cancer targets that can be recognised by T-cells,” said Singh, who is scientific coordinator of the EU-funded GAPVAC phase I trial which is testing personalised vaccines in glioblastoma, the most common and aggressive brain cancer. “In the GAPVAC trial we will treat glioblastoma patients with vaccines that are ideal for each patient because they contain personalised antigens.”1 For all patients in the GAPVAC study, researchers will identify genes expressed in the tumour, peptides presented on the human leukocyte antigen (HLA) receptor (i.e…

New model of follow up for breast cancer patients — ScienceDaily

International guidelines recommend annual follow-up mammograms for every woman after treatment for early breast cancer, regardless of the risk of her cancer returning. There is also no strong evidence to support annual mammography compared with other possible mammography schedules. …

Gene linked to tamoxifen-resistant breast cancers — ScienceDaily

The gene, called MACROD2, might also be useful in screening for some aggressive forms of breast cancers, and, someday, offering a new target for therapy, says Ben Ho Park, M.D., Ph.D., an associate professor of oncology in the Kimmel Cancer Center’s Breast Cancer Program and a member of the research team. The drug tamoxifen is used to treat estrogen receptor-positive breast cancers. Cells in this type of breast cancer produce protein receptors in their nuclei which bind to and grow in response to the hormone estrogen. Tamoxifen generally blocks the binding process of the estrogen-receptor, but some estrogen receptor-positive cancers are resistant or become resistant to tamoxifen therapy, finding ways to elude its effects…

Pathology specialist contributes to debate on breast cancer gene screening — ScienceDaily

Glenn E. Palomaki, PhD, associate director of the Division of Medical Screening and Special Testing in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at Women & Infants Hospital of Rhode Island has recently published an invited commentary in the November issue of Genetics in Medicine…

Quality of biopsy directly linked to survival in patients with bladder cancer — ScienceDaily

The two-year study found that about half of bladder cancer patients who were biopsied had insufficient material — meaning there was no bladder wall muscle retrieved — to accurately stage the cancer. Additionally, the UCLA research team found that a suboptimal biopsy and incorrect tumor staging was associated with a significant increase in deaths from bladder cancer, said study first author Dr…

Treatment breakthrough for advanced bladder cancer — ScienceDaily

Published today in Nature, the study examined an antibody (MPDL3280A) which blocks a protein (PD-L1) thought to help cancer cells evade immune detection. In a phase one, multi-centre international clinical trial, 68 patients with advanced bladder cancer (who had failed all other standard treatments such as chemotherapy) received MPDL3280A, a cancer immunotherapy medicine being developed by Roche. In addition, patients were all tested for the protein PD-L1 and around 30 were identified as having PD-L1 positive tumours. After six weeks of treatment, 43 per cent of PD-L1-positive patients found their tumour had shrunk…

Power behind ‘master’ gene for cancer discovered — ScienceDaily

In bean sprouts, a collection of amino acids known as a protein complex allows them to grow longer in the darkness than in the light. In humans, a similar protein complex called CSN and its subunit CSN6 is now believed to be a cancer-causing gene that impacts activity of another gene (Myc) tied to tumor growth. Somehow the same mechanisms that result in bigger bean sprouts, also cause cancer metastasis and tumor development…