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Scientists map risk of premature menopause after cancer treatment

The findings, set out in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, are based on the experience of more than 2,000 young women in England and Wales treated for the cancer over a period of more than 40 years. Previous research has suggested that women with Hodgkin lymphoma who receive certain types of chemotherapy or radiotherapy are at increased risk of going through the menopause early — but there was insufficient information to provide patients with detailed advice. But the new study, led by scientists at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, provides precise estimates of risk for women depending on which treatment types and doses they received and at what age — allowing doctors to give them detailed advice about their risks of future infertility…

When it comes to raising vitamin D levels, anesthesiologists advise: Don’t be wimpy!

There’s already enough evidence to justify increasing vitamin D levels to improve health, according to the opinion piece by Drs Michael F. Roizen of the Cleveland Clinic and Jeffrey D. Roizen of Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Meanwhile, they propose a randomized trial to conclusively determine whether vitamin D can reduce complication rates after surgery…

Natural (born) killer cells battle pediatric leukemia

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is the most common cancer of childhood. This disease hinders the development of healthy blood cells while cancer cells proliferate. Currently, children with ALL receive chemotherapy for two to three years, exposing them to significant side effects including changes in normal development and future fertility. …

Device monitors key step in development of tumor metastases

“This device gives us a platform to be used in testing and comparing compounds to block or delay the epithelial-mesenchymal transition, potentially slowing the progression of cancer,” says Daniel Irimia, MD, PhD, associate director of the BioMEMS Resource Center in the MGH Department of Surgery. Normally a stage in embryonic development, EMT is important during normal wound healing and also appears to take place when epithelial cells lining bodily surfaces and cavities become malignant. Instead of adhering to each other tightly in layers, cells that have undergone EMT gain the ability to separate out, move to other parts of the body and implant themselves into the new sites. Cells that have transitioned into a mesenchymal state appear to be more resistant to cancer therapies or other measures designed to induce cell death. …

Previous pulmonary disease linked to increased lung cancer risk in large study

“Associations between various respiratory diseases and lung cancer have been shown in earlier studies, but few of these studies considered multiple respiratory diseases simultaneously,” said researcher Ann Olsson, PhD, of the International Agency for Research in Cancer in Lyon, France. …

RNA combination therapy for lung cancer offers promise for personalized medicine

This week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers at the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT now report that they have successfully delivered small RNA therapies in a clinically relevant mouse model of lung cancer to slow and shrink tumor growth. Their research offers promise for personalized RNA combination therapies to improve therapeutic response. …

Guidelines can predict early menopause in child cancer survivors, giving hope for fertility

The criteria — developed in Edinburgh — will help to select which girls should be offered the opportunity to freeze some tissue from their ovaries for use in the future. Doctors are optimistic that the frozen tissue could one day help young cancer survivors to have children of their own…

Leukemia: Scientists make major breakthrough in understanding disease

The study was conducted amongst children with Down’s syndrome — who are 20-50 times more prone to childhood leukemias than other children — and involved analysing the DNA sequence of patients at different stages of leukemia. The researchers uncovered that two key genes (called RAS and JAK) can mutate to turn normal blood cells into cancer cells. However, these two genes never mutate together, as one seems to exclude the other. This discovery means we can begin to identify which of the two genes are mutated in patients, and therefore more effectively target their cancer in lower doses (reducing toxicity for the patient) with less side-effects…

Researchers target rapid destruction of protein responsible for cancer cell resistance to therapy

“These findings may lead to a new target for chemoresistant cancer cells,” said Ruth W. Craig, PhD, professor of Pharmacology & Toxicology, Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth, Hanover, NH, who is primary author of the peer reviewed article. “These cells are resistant to multiple types of standard chemotherapeutic agents because of over-expression of Myeloid Cell Leukemia-1 (Mcl-1), however, Mcl-1 expression plummets when we inhibit one particular enzyme and then cancer cells subsequently die.” The Mcl-1 protein is frequently over-expressed in cancer; it is present not only in leukemia and lymphoma but also in a host of solid tumors. …