Tag Archives: cancer-center

Clinical waste may be valuable for monitoring treatment response in ovarian cancer

"We were able to demonstrate that simply squirting small amounts of otherwise discarded ascites fluid into our device allowed us to quantify tumor cells and explore mechanistic markers of tumor progression without the need to process liters of ascites with advanced instrumentation not readily available in many community hospitals," says Cesar Castro, MD, MMSc, MGH Cancer Center and Center for Systems Biology, co-lead author of the PNAS paper. "Moreover, achieving point-of-care readouts of tumor cell markers from repeatedly collected ascites at different time points, could allow for frequent monitoring of treatment response without having to wait for the next imaging scan." The ability to reliably track treatment response essentially lets caregivers know whether a particular anticancer drug should be continued or if another option should be tried. Tumor recurrence begins before metastases become visible on imaging studies, so several options for non-invasive "liquid biopsies" are being investigated, including analysis of circulating tumor cells and other factors found in the blood. Since ovarian cancer metastases are usually confined to the abdominal cavity and ascites commonly form in advanced disease, the research team theorized that ascites fluid could be an alternative, if not better, option than blood for treatment monitoring. …

Criteria shows one year death risk at time of hospital admission

"There are many prognostic indices, but until now none meant to be used immediately upon hospital admission," says Stacy Fischer, MD, CU Cancer Center investigator and assistant professor of internal medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. "Basically, with five criteria — none of which require obtaining labs or data gathering — we can accurately predict who is at low, medium and high risk for death within a year," says Jeanie Youngwerth, MD, CU Cancer Center investigator and Palliative Care specialist at the University of Colorado Hospital and School of Medicine. …

Cancer researchers translate new findings to enhance melanoma treatment

Translational researchers from UCLA’s Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center (JCCC) have published results of two back-to-back studies in the journal Cancer Discovery that provide critical insights into two key areas of how tumors resist BRAF inhibitors: the key cell-signaling pathways BRAF-mutant melanoma cells use to learn how to become resistant to inhibitor drugs, and how the limited focus of BRAF inhibitors allows melanoma cells to evolve and develop drug resistance. The studies were published online ahead of print on November 21, 2013…

Smoking increases risk of death for nasopharyngeal carcinoma survivors

"While it is established that tobacco smoke is a risk factor for nasopharyngeal carcinoma [the most common cancer arising from the upper part of the throat behind the nose and near the base of skull], its role in influencing survival of patients with established cancers is not known," said Fang-Yun Xie, M.D., professor in the Department of Radiation Oncology at the Sun Yat-sen University Cancer Center in Guangzhou, China. …

Experimental drug shows promise in lung cancer

The preliminary results of a phase 1B study were presented by Dr. Edward Garon, director of thoracic oncology at UCLA’s Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center, on Tuesday October 29 at the 15th World Conference on Lung Cancer. The summit was held by the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer, in Sydney, Australia…

Debunking myths about how cancer spreads

Can getting a biopsy spread cancer? Internet rumors have been circulating for years linking needle biopsies to spreading cancer. There is no evidence that a needle biopsy, a procedure used to diagnose many types of cancer, causes the cells to spread. "Needle biopsies of early-onset lesions in the breast, thyroid or lung allow us to diagnose cancer often before it has spread," said Dr. …

Biomarker predicts risk of breast cancer recurrence after tamoxifen treatment

"Most patients with early-stage, ER-positive breast cancer remain cancer-free after five years of tamoxifen treatment, but they remain at risk of recurrence for 15 years or longer after their initial treatment," says Dennis Sgroi, MD, of the MGH Cancer Center and Department of Pathology, lead and corresponding author of the report. "Our biomarker identifies the subgroup of patients who continue to be at risk of recurrence after tamoxifen treatment and who will benefit from extended therapy with letrozole, which should allow many women to avoid unnecessary extended treatment." Previous research by Sgroi’s team, in collaboration with investigators from bioTheranostics Inc., discovered that the ratio between levels of expression of two genes — HOXB13 and IL17BR — in tumor tissue predicted the risk of recurrence of ER-positive, lymph-node-negative breast cancer, whether or not the patient was treated with tamoxifen. …

Tumor-activated protein promotes cancer spread

The findings are published in this week’s online Early Edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Roughly 90 percent of all cancer deaths are due to metastasis — the disease spreading from the original tumor site to multiple, distant tissues and finally overwhelming the patient’s body. Lymph vessels are often the path of transmission, with circulating tumor cells lodging in the lymph nodes — organs distributed throughout the body that act as immune system garrisons and traps for pathogens and foreign particles. The researchers, led by principal investigator Judith A. …