Tag Archives: professor

New route for ovarian cancer spread discovered

“This completely new way of thinking about ovarian cancer metastasis provides new potential avenues to predict and prevent recurrence or metastasis,” said senior author Anil Sood, M.D., professor of Gynecologic Oncology and Reproductive Medicine and Cancer Biology. The researchers found the circulating tumor cells (CTCs) rely on HER3, a less-famous sibling of the HER2 receptor protein prominent in some breast cancers, to find their way to the omentum, a sheet of tissue that covers and supports abdominal organs. HER3’s heavy presence on these cells makes it a biomarker candidate and suggests possible therapeutic options to thwart ovarian cancer progression, the researchers noted…

High-tech ‘whole body’ scan could improve treatment of bone marrow cancer

The new type of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan could improve care for a type of cancer called myeloma and reduce reliance on bone marrow biopsies, which can be painful for patients and often fail to show doctors how far the disease has spread. The research is published today in the journal Radiology and was carried out by researchers at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, and The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust. It received funding from Cancer Research UK and the National Institute for Health Research Clinical Research Facility in Imaging, with additional funding from the EPSRC. The new whole-body, diffusion-weighted MRI scans showed the spread of cancer throughout the bone marrow of patients with myeloma — one of the most common forms of blood cancer — more accurately than standard tests…

Immune therapy might be effective for multiple myeloma

The researchers modified a type of human immune cell — called T lymphocytes, or T cells — to target a molecule called CS1, which is found on more than 95 percent of myeloma cells, and to kill the cells. The researchers grew the modified cells in the lab to increase their numbers and then injected them into an animal model where they again killed human myeloma cells. The findings were published in the journal Clinical Cancer Research…

‘Signatures’ of genetic mutations in colorectal cancer: Discovery may advance diagnosis, treatment

The technological tour de force, described in the current issue of the journal Nature as the first integrated “proteogenomic” characterization of human cancer, “will enable new advances” in diagnosing and treating the disease, the scientists concluded. “It’s a first-of-its-kind paper. I think it’s a very important advance in the field,” said senior author Daniel Liebler, Ph.D., Ingram Professor of Cancer Research and director of the Jim Ayers Institute for Precancer Detection and Diagnosis at the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center. The research team, representing Vanderbilt and six other institutions, is part of the Clinical Proteomic Tumor Analysis Consortium (CPTAC), sponsored by the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health (NIH)…

U.S. cervical cancer rates higher than previously reported, especially among older women, African-American women

Previous research finds an age-standardized rate of about 12 cases of cervical cancer per 100,000 women in the United States, with the incidence reaching a peak at age 40-44 and then leveling off. However, these estimates included women who had hysterectomies in which the lower part of the uterus, the cervix, was removed. By excluding these women, who are no longer at risk of developing this cancer, from their analysis, the researchers calculated a rate of 18.6 cases of cervical cancer per 100,000 women. They found the incidence increased steadily with age and peaked at a higher rate and at an older age, specifically in women 65-69 years old…

Harnessing power of immune system for therapies against cancer

The new studies find high activity with investigative drugs for advanced melanoma, and show for the first time that ipilimumab, a treatment already approved for advanced melanoma, can substantially decrease the risk of melanoma recurrence in certain patients with earlier-stage disease. In addition, another small trial reports that a one-time, personalized immunotherapy treatment induces complete and long-lasting remissions in a small number of women with advanced cervical cancer — a disease with little to no effective treatment options. …

Tool helps guide brain cancer surgery

The Purdue-designed tool sprays a microscopic stream of charged solvent onto the tissue surface to gather information about its molecular makeup and produces a color-coded image that reveals the location, nature and concentration of tumor cells. “In a matter of seconds this technique offers molecular information that can detect residual tumor that otherwise may have been left behind in the patient,” said R. Graham Cooks, the Purdue professor who co-led the research team. …

Test increases odds of correct surgery for thyroid cancer patients

The test, available at the UPMC/UPCI Multidisciplinary Thyroid Center and other diagnostic testing agencies, improved the chances of patients getting the correct initial surgery by 30 percent, according to the study published this month in the Annals of Surgery. “Before this test, about one in five potential thyroid cancer cases couldn’t be diagnosed without an operation to remove a portion of the thyroid,” said lead author Linwah Yip, M.D., assistant professor of surgery in Pitt’s School of Medicine and UPMC surgical oncologist…

Diagnosing physicians influence treatment decisions for prostate cancer patients, study finds — ScienceDaily

The findings, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, sought to examine why active surveillance, a management program for low-risk disease, which includes repeat PSAs, prostate exams and biopsies, is underused in this patient population. According to the American Cancer Society, 233,000 new cases of prostate cancer will be diagnosed this year, making it the most common non-skin cancer in men…