Tag Archives: university

Version 2.0 of Prostate Cancer Risk Calculator now online, complete with emojis — ScienceDaily

“The prostate cancer risk calculator has been updated using current risk factors and a better interface; the current version gives a more nuanced result that helps understand a man’s risk of prostate cancer,” said Ian M. Thompson Jr., M.D., director of the Cancer Therapy & Research Center at the UT Health Science Center, who helped develop the risk calculator and co-authored a commentary published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association. The free calculator on the Health Science Center website takes just minutes to use and gives a man more information about his risk for both low-grade prostate cancer, which may never require treatment, and high-grade prostate cancer. It provides an “emoji” graphic readout that puts the numeric percentages into a visual perspective. …

Mammography benefits women over 75, new study finds

The value of mammography screening in older women has been subject to much debate in recent years. The American Cancer Society recommends annual mammograms for women age 75 and older as long as they are in good health, while the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) does not recommend mammography screening in this age group, citing insufficient evidence to evaluate benefits and harms. A lack of research is chiefly responsible for the divergent recommendations, according to Judith A…

Tool to better visualize, analyze human genomic data developed

Next-generation sequencing has revolutionized functional genomics. These techniques are key to understanding the molecular mechanisms underlying cell function in healthy and diseased individuals and the development of diseases like cancer. Data from multiple experiments need to be integrated, but the growing number of data sets makes a thorough comparison and analysis of results challenging. …

Cell plasticity may provide clues to origin of aggressive type of breast cancer

A team of researchers, led by Candice A.M. Sauder, M.D., while a resident at the Indiana University Department of Surgery, reported online in BMC Cell Biology that healthy breast cells separated from their normal environment were able to transform into types of cells similar to those seen in metaplastic carcinoma, a form of triple negative breast cancer. …

Bladder cancer patients identified who could benefit from ‘tumor-softening’ treatment — ScienceDaily

“This fascinating new finding could help doctors adapt their treatments to patients with bladder cancer,” said Nell Barrie, Cancer Research UK The team from The University of Manchester, funded by the Medical Research Council, found that patients whose bladder tumor had high levels of a protein, called ‘HIF-1α’, were more likely to benefit from having carbogen — oxygen mixed with carbon dioxide gas — and nicotinamide tablets at the same time as their radiotherapy. The treatment, called ‘CON’, makes radiotherapy more effective. By comparing levels of HIF-1α in tissue samples from 137 patients who had radiotherapy on its own or with CON, the researchers found the protein predicted which patients benefited from having CON. High levels of the protein were linked to better survival from the disease when patients had radiotherapy and CON. …

Protein ZEB1 promotes breast tumor resistance to radiation therapy — ScienceDaily

One protein with the even more out-there name of ZEB1 (zinc finger E-box binding homeobox 1), is now thought to keep breast cancer cells from being successfully treated with radiation therapy, according to a study at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. …

Eating resistant starch may help reduce red meat-related colorectal cancer risk

“Red meat and resistant starch have opposite effects on the colorectal cancer-promoting miRNAs, the miR-17-92 cluster,” said Karen J. Humphreys, PhD, a research associate at the Flinders Center for Innovation in Cancer at Flinders University in Adelaide, Australia. “This finding supports consumption of resistant starch as a means of reducing the risk associated with a high red meat diet.” “Total meat consumption in the USA, European Union, and the developed world has continued to increase from the 1960s, and in some cases has nearly doubled,” added Humphreys…

Expressive writing may help breast cancer survivors — ScienceDaily

“The key to developing an expressive writing intervention is the writing instruction. Otherwise, writing is just like a journal recording facts and events. Writing a journal can be therapeutic, but oftentimes we don’t get the empirical evidence to determine whether it’s effective or not,” said Qian Lu, assistant professor and director of the Culture and Health Research Center at UH…