Tag Archives: medical

Heart disease risk appears associated with breast cancer radiation

Several reports have suggested links between breast cancer radiation and long-term cardiovascular-related deaths, according to the study background. Researchers examined the radiation treatment plans of 48 patients with stage 0 through IIA breast cancer who were treated after 2005 at the New York University Department of Radiation Oncology. They calculated the association between radiation treatment factors, such as mean cardiac dose, cardiac risk, treatment side, body positioning and coronary events. …

Zebrafish useful tool in prostate cancer stem cell study

Prostate cancers are suggested to contain self-renewing tumor stem cells that have the ability to grow uncontrollably and spread. Identified as tumor-initiating cells (TICs), research has shown that these cells are found to be resistant to standard chemotherapy. A desirable treatment strategy is to develop therapies that would effectively target the self-renewing capabilities of the TICs, which requires better identification of TICs themselves. Utilizing prostate cancer samples from patients diagnosed at the Cancer Institute of New Jersey between 2008 and 2012, Cancer Institute investigators used mouse and zebrafish models to identify the frequencies of TICs from each patient’s prostate cancer cells. …

Positive personal growth following breast cancer diagnosis

"Many women who have breast cancer often experience distress but sometimes are surprised that they also may experience a variety of positive outcomes following diagnosis," said Suzanne Danhauer, Ph.D., associate professor of public health sciences at Wake Forest Baptist and lead author of the study. The study, which is published in the current online edition of the journal Psycho-Oncology, examined change in post-traumatic growth (PTG) over two years in 653 women. PTG is defined as the positive psychological change experienced as a result of a struggle with highly challenging life circumstances. …

Review of daily aspirin dosage highlights concerns about side effects

The possible benefits of a daily dose have been promoted as a primary prevention for people who are currently free of, but at risk of developing, cardiovascular disease or colorectal cancer. However, any such benefit needs to be balanced alongside a fuller understanding of the potentially harmful side effects such as bleeding and gastrointestinal problems. The paper, published by the National Institute for Health Research Health Technology Assessment (NIHR HTA) Programme, reviews the wealth of available randomised controlled trials (RCTs), systematic reviews and meta-analyses, allowing the team from Warwick Evidence to quantify those relative benefits and risks. The reported benefits of taking aspirin each day ranged from 10% reduction in major cardiovascular events to a 15% drop in total coronary heart disease. …

BROCA sequencing approach evaluates all 24 genes implicated in breast cancer

With the development of modern genomics sequencing tools, the discovery of additional genes implicated in breast cancer and the change in the legal status of genetic testing for BRCA1 and BRCA2, it is now possible to determine how often families in these circumstances actually do carry cancer-predisposing mutations in BRCA1, BRCA2, or another gene implicated in breast cancer, despite the results of their previous genetic tests. This was the challenge addressed by Mary-Claire King, Ph.D., American Cancer Society Professor of Medicine and Genome Sciences, and Tomas Walsh, Ph.D., Associate Research Professor of Medical Genetics, both at the University of Washington, Seattle. They conducted complete genomic sequencing of all genes implicated in breast cancer on DNA samples from breast cancer patients who had normal BRCA1 and BRCA2 commercial test results. …

Patients report not being told of risk of overdiagnosis in cancer screenings

Cancer screenings can find treatable disease at an earlier stage but they can also detect cancers that will never progress to cause symptoms. Detection of these early, slow-growing cancers can lead to unnecessary surgery, chemotherapy and radiation, the authors write in the study background. Researchers conducted an online survey of 317 U.S. …

Overexpressed protein to be culprit in certain thyroid cancers

The scientists found that over-activation of a certain protein in hormone-secreting cells helps fuel medullary thyroid cancer cells in mice as well as in human cells, making the protein a potentially good target for therapies to inhibit the growth of these cancer cells. The discovery by the multidisciplinary team at UT Southwestern has implications for neuroendocrine cancers that arise in organs farther removed from the brain, including the lung and the pancreas. Although rare, medullary thyroid cancer is often fatal. …

Four genetic variants linked to esophageal cancer and its precursor, Barrett’s esophagus

The findings, by corresponding author Thomas L. Vaughan, M.D., M.P.H., a member of the Epidemiology Program in the Public Health Sciences Division at Fred Hutch, are published online ahead of the December print issue of Nature Genetics. Vaughan co-led the project with co-author David Whiteman, Ph.D., head of the Cancer Control Group at QIMR (formerly known as the Queensland Institute for Medical Research). …