British scientists have made a significant breakthrough in the treatment of ovarian cancer by discovering a way to reverse the resistance to drugs that denies thousands of women patients each year a chance of survival.

Ovarian Cancer is a common disease and one of the hardest to treat. Around 70 per cent of patients cannot be cured because they develop resistance to the chemotherapy which targets the malignant cells.

Professor Hani Gabra and his team at the Hammersmith Hospital in west London have discovered four major gene pathways that could reverse the resistance. This opens up the prospect of developing a drug to block these pathways and allow the chemotherapy to carry on working. The drugs in question, cisplatin and carboplatin – also known as platinum chemotherapy – are given as injections after surgery.

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In September of 1998, the FDA approved Herceptin to treat breast cancer after it had become metastatic. Few days back,  the FDA approved Herceptin’s use for women diagnosed with breast cancer just after surgery. The drug is already widely prescribed for adjuvant therapy even without the FDA’s approval, a practice called off-label use. Off-label use means that a prescription drug is being prescribed for a purpose not listed on the product’s label. This is a common and acceptable practice by doctors and the Food and Drug Administration.Clinical trials were conducted that showed women who received Herceptin (trastuzumab) given along with chemotherapy had fewer relapses than those who only received chemotherapy. Twenty to thirty percent of women diagnosed with breast cancer have this genetic alteration of the HER2 gene and could benefit by being treated with Herceptin.

A test that measures the amounts of two members of the same protein family – one of which appears to act as an oncogene, and the other as a tumor suppressor – helps identify patients with breast cancer who will likely benefit from chemotherapy and those who won’t, according to researchers.

OncoPlan, a test is already commercially available, and it has been shown to predict the aggressiveness of tumors and disease recurrence after surgery in breast, colon and stomach cancers. Now researchers believe that it may help predict as to which breast cancer patients would benefit most from chemotherapy.

A study was presented at the first meeting on Molecular Diagnostics in Cancer Therapeutic Development; researchers looked at the two forms of protein measured by OncoPlan in 2,380 women with breast cancer. Out of these 717 had undergone chemotherapy.

They found that the women who had low levels of one of the proteins and did not receive chemotherapy had very poor outcomes. The same women who did receive chemotherapy, however, had a twofold reduced risk of relapsing and dying from their disease. The women who had high levels of the protein were much more likely to survive their disease, and appeared to derive no additional benefit from chemotherapy. However, more research is needed to clarify the ability of OncoPlan in predicting outcomes of chemotherapy.

A. Raymond Frackelton Jr., an associate professor at Brown University and vice president of Research at Catalyst Oncology (the company marketing OncoPlan), said

“But even at this point, the results are very exciting because, with further validation in clinical trials, OncoPlan, which is already being used to predict disease aggressiveness, will help to ensure that individual patients receive the most beneficial therapies”

Under a new proposed law, sixth grade girls of Michigan State are required to be vaccinated against cervical cancer. The proposed law would require girls headed for sixth grade next year to be immunized against the human papilloma virus (HPV), which causes most cervical cancers and can also cause genital warts.

The American Cancer Society estimates that 9,700 women will be diagnosed with cervical cancer this year, and that more than a third of those cases will be fatal. Cervical cancer is second only to breast cancer in the number of diagnoses made every year. The vaccine, approved by the Food and Drug Administration in June, was shown to be 100 percent effective against HPV.

Doctors say it works best if administered before girls are sexually active.

Rosemont Mayor Donald E. Stephens is one of the nation’s longest-serving mayors. Stephens, 78, announced on Thursday, that he has undergone surgery for stomach cancer and hopes to return to work soon. Doctors operated on Stephens in May at Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge.

The northwest suburban mayor said he finished radiation treatments about two weeks ago and anticipates a full recovery. Stephens’s condition has been kept as a secret. He has had a series of health issues in the last nine months. Last December, he underwent triple-bypass surgery. In May, he missed his village’s 50th anniversary gala because of another health problem before his cancer surgery.

“I’m tired. The radiation knocks the socks out of you,” Stephens said. “Other than that, I’m doing just fine.” “I just didn’t want all this sympathy,” Stephens explained when asked why his condition was kept secret.

As per an international study, doctors can determine the risk of breast cancer recurrence or death with the help of a test that checks the expression of 70 genes related with breast cancer. The studies included as many as 307 patients and were followed for 13.6 years. The patients were categorized in to high- and low-risk groups based on their scores from the 70-gene signature test and standard risk-assessment using a software program.

Researchers said that the gene signature test proved to more useful and a good predictor of breast cancer recurrence and death, than the software. Apart from that, the research study concluded that the signature gene test included most of the prognostic information provided by traditional risk classifiers. This 70 gene signature test will be performed on a larger scale on around 6000 women who are at early stage of breast cancer. The trial will assess whether the test can improve identification of women who can safely be spared adjuvant chemotherapy.

As per a scientist at Netherlands Cancer Institute in Amsterdam, “These results indicate that the gene signature adds independent prognostic information”

These findings were published in the Sept. 6 issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

Source: Yahoo Press Release 

AHMEDABAD, Gujarat, India, Sept. 1 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Cancer patients in the Indian state of Gujarat can now receive state-of-the-art image-guided radiotherapy (IGRT) treatments using equipment from Varian Medical Systems with the opening of a new radiation oncology center at Apollo Hospital, Ahmedabad. On Thursday, August 24, clinicians delivered the first IGRT treatment at the center to a prostate cancer patient in his 70s.

The new facility was established through an alliance between the Comprehensive Blood and Cancer Center (CBCC) of Bakersfield, California, USA, and Apollo Hospital Groups, one of the largest healthcare groups in South and South East Asia.

The CBCC facility at Apollo Hospital is the first treatment center in South Asia to offer IGRT using a treatment system that combines imaging and treatment technologies on a single machine. Radiation is delivered using Varian’s Clinac® iX linear accelerator equipped with an On-Board Imager(TM) device for imaging and tumor tracking.

“This is a great moment for cancer care in India,” said Gitesh Patel, CBCC’s vice president for business development. “We are offering Indian cancer patients the same standards of care that we offer to our patients in the U.S. That meant outfitting the Indian center with Varian’s cutting edge technology for efficient delivery of accurate and precise image-guided radiation therapy treatments,” said Ravi Patel, MD, founder of CBCC.

According to Vivek Bansal, MD, radiation oncologist at Apollo Hospital Ahmedabad, the first patient is continuing treatment with daily radiotherapy sessions administered five days per week over a period of seven weeks. The treatment team uses the On-Board Imager prior to each treatment to precisely locate a set of gold markers that have been implanted into the patient’s prostate gland in order to accurately account for any changes in tumor position from day to day.

“The prostate moves around constantly due to normal physiological processes,” Bansal said. “With the On-Board Imager, we can detect very small displacements and make appropriate corrections. We use it in radiographic mode to detect the gold marker seeds and reposition the patient, and then we generate a three-dimensional cone-beam CT image to verify the accuracy of our positioning corrections.”

For More Info Visit:  Source: Yahoo Press Release

Around 40 New Zealand breast cancer patients are hoped to be taking part in an international drug trial which aims to improve medication used to prevent recurrence of the disease.

The trial will compare two new aromatatse inhibitors – treatments which effectively starve breast cancer cells of oestrogen, preventing the disease from recurring in post-treatment breast cancer patients.

Research nurse Jenni Scarlet is co-ordinating the trial from Waikato and Auckland Hospitals, and said it was hoped about 5000 women worldwide would take part.

The trial would not suit all breast cancer patients – the women must be post-menopausal, and have already received treatment for the disease.

The trial is being funded by pharmaceutical research company Novartis.

She said the current inhibitor, tamoxifen, had been used for between 25 and 30 years.

A new family of three inhibitors had been created nearly 10 years ago, and the trial would put two of them – anastrozole and letrozole – head to head against each other.

Both were believed to be more effective than tamoxifen.

The drugs would be tested for their effectiveness in shutting down the cancer cells and their side effects, including the impact on bone density.

She said it was hoped about 20 women at each hospital would take part in the trial.

Source: Stuff

TEENAGERS with cancer would stand a better chance of survival if they were treated at a specialist centre for young people, an expert said today.

Health bosses are exploring proposals to establish a cancer treatment facility in Edinburgh dedicated to the care of adolescents and young adults as part of an on-going review of children’s services.

Currently, young cancer patients are either treated on paediatric wards or among adults – a situation which leaves them isolated from their peers.

Gill Harley is based in Edinburgh and is Scotland’s only specialist nurse dedicated to the well-being of teenagers and young adults with cancer.

She believes the health service has so far underestimated the clinical benefits associated with providing teenagers with the space to relax with their peers, play music or study while in hospital.

She said: “What we would dearly love to have in Edinburgh is a teenager cancer unit. We need one area where there is appropriate accommodation for their age group and where the staff are specially trained.

“It improves the cure rate when young people are in one of these units because it improves their morale because they are with like-minded people. Ideally what we would be hoping for is a unit at the Western General Hospital – that would be our dream.”

Mrs Harley said specialist facilities for young people are now commonplace in England and centres are also planned in the west of Scotland.

She added: “Staff are realising that this is a lost tribe that has missed out because they have been locked into paediatric or adult care. We need to design treatment around that age group.”

Mrs Harley’s post was established by the charity Macmillan Cancer Support and she is currently looking after almost 200 young people.

As well as helping the young person come to terms with their diagnosis, she also talks to the patient’s peers and urges them to remain in frequent contact. She is on hand via e-mail, text message and telephone to answer queries from her patients.

“I’m supporting them in any way I can,” she said.

“Most of the treatment for this age group is very intense. The chemotherapy is intense so they have a longer period when they are in hospital and they become very ill.

“I will visit them on the ward and really make sure their symptoms are well managed and they are being seen by the right people. I’m the glue that sticks everyone together in a way so we can make sure there is a seamless service.”

Mrs Harley said there is also a need for at least two more specialist nurses as she receives referrals from across Scotland.

NHS Lothian said the future of young people’s services will be considered as part of an on-going review which also includes plans for a new Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Edinburgh.

Jackie Sansbury, NHS Lothian’s director of strategic planning and modernisation, said: “We have just started consultations on a children and young person’s strategy and part of that will be looking at the delivery of healthcare to children over 13 years old – concentrating on those aged up to 16 to 18 years.

“The new build, planned to reprovide the services from the Royal Hospital for Sick Children, will give us the perfect opportunity to do this. More specific details about the shape of the new services we need to provide will not be known until our consultations have been completed.”

Read More : Scotsman 

PHARMAC has announced it is to fund a taxane drug for use in early stage breast cancer.

The decision to fund Paclitaxel from tomorrow is expected to see up to 550 women with early breast cancer treated with the medicine.

Taxanes are a class of chemotherapeutic drug funded for a number of cancers including ovarian, fallopian and metastatic breast cancer.

Medical Director Peter Moodie says clinical data show using taxanes can help women with breast cancer live longer.

The widened funding will cost DHBs 12.5 million over five years.

Earlier this year PHARMAC decided not to fund Herceptin for early stage breast cancer sufferers.