Tag Archives: practice

Weight at time of diagnosis linked to prostate cancer mortality

This study included 751 Kaiser Permanente patients with prostate cancer who underwent radical prostatectomy, an operation that includes removal of the prostate and surrounding tissue. The researchers explored the association between the patients’ body mass index and prostate cancer mortality, adjusted for tumor aggressiveness and other characteristics…

New therapy improves life span in melanoma patients with brain metastases

The study that was recently published in Chemotherapy Research and Practice, reviews cases of eight patients who underwent this therapy at Saint Louis University. John Richart, M.D., associate professor of internal medicine at SLU and principal investigator of the study, first treated a patient with the disease using the HD IL-2 treatment in 1999. "Traditionally, melanoma patients with brain metastases have not been considered for HD IL-2 because treatment was thought to be futile," Richart said. "Our study shows that having this condition does not exclude a patient from getting this treatment and can in fact improve the length of their life." Melanoma is the most dangerous form of skin cancer that begins in the melanin-producing cells called melanocytes…