Cancer News and Discussions

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weatheriscool
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Scientists can detect brain tumours using a simple urine or blood plasma test
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2021-07- ... urine.html
by University of Cambridge
Researchers from the Cancer Research UK Cambridge Institute have developed two tests that can detect the presence of glioma, a type of brain tumor, in patient urine or blood plasma.

The team say that a test for detecting glioma using urine is the first of its kind in the world.

Although the research, published in EMBO Molecular Medicine, is in its early stages and only a small number of patients were analyzed, the team say their results are promising.

The researchers suggest that in the future, these tests could be used by GPs to monitor patients at high risk of brain tumors, which may be more convenient than having an MRI every three months, which is the standard method.
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A magnetic helmet shrunk a deadly tumor in world-first test

The user-friendly medical device can be operated at home.

July 26th, 2021

We've seen helmets and AI that can spot brain tumors, but a new hard hat can actually treat them, too. As part of the latest neurological breakthrough, researchers used a helmet that generates a magnetic field to shrink a deadly tumor by a third. The 53-year-old patient who underwent the treatment ultimately passed away due to an unrelated injury. But, an autopsy of his brain showed that the procedure had removed 31 percent of the tumor mass in a short time. The test marked the first noninvasive therapy for a deadly form of brain cancer known as glioblastoma.

https://www.engadget.com/magnetic-helme ... 23598.html


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weatheriscool
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Turning the molecular clock back on halts neuroblastoma tumor growth
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2021-07- ... tumor.html
by Graciela Gutierrez, Baylor College of Medicine
Researchers at Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Children's Cancer Center have found that the molecular clock may be key to treating neuroblastoma. The researchers studied patients with high expression of MYCN, known to be the major oncogenic driver of neuroblastoma. In those patients, two main components of the molecular clock were repressed—BMAL1, which oscillates to drive the clock cycle, and RORa, which activates BMAL1. This repression correlated with poor clinical outcome.

"We were very interested in how MYCN can reprogram tumor metabolism," said Dr. Eveline Barbieri, assistant professor of pediatrics—hematology and oncology at Baylor. "We found that MYCN amplification inhibits BMAL1 expression and oscillation, leading to metabolic reprograming and oncogenesis."

Because BMAL1 and RORa suppression allowed the tumor cells to grow, the researchers wanted to know if restoring these components of the molecular clock would stop growth in neuroblastoma cells. They tested two approaches in the lab—genetic overexpression of RORa and a pharmaceutical approach using a synthetic ligand that reactivates RORa. Both techniques successfully restored BMAL1 expression and oscillation.
weatheriscool
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New drug combo shows early potential for treating pancreatic cancer
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2021-08- ... eatic.html
by Anne Trafton, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Pancreatic cancer, which affects about 60,000 Americans every year, is one of the deadliest forms of cancer. After diagnosis, fewer than 10 percent of patients survive for five years.

While some chemotherapies are initially effective, pancreatic tumors often become resistant to them. The disease has also proven difficult to treat with newer approaches such as immunotherapy. However, a team of MIT researchers has now developed an immunotherapy strategy and shown that it can eliminate pancreatic tumors in mice.

The new therapy, which is a combination of three drugs that help boost the body's own immune defenses against tumors, is expected to enter clinical trials later this year.

"We don't have a lot of good options for treating pancreatic cancer. It's a devastating disease clinically," says William Freed-Pastor, a senior postdoc at MIT's Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research. "If this approach led to durable responses in patients, it would make a big impact in at least a subset of patients' lives, but we need to see how it will actually perform in trials."

Freed-Pastor, who is also a medical oncologist at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, is the lead author of the new study, which appears today in Cancer Cell. Tyler Jacks, the David H. Koch Professor of Biology and a member of the Koch Institute, is the paper's senior author.
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Yuli Ban
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weatheriscool wrote: Fri Aug 06, 2021 12:24 am New drug combo shows early potential for treating pancreatic cancer
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2021-08- ... eatic.html
by Anne Trafton, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Pancreatic cancer, which affects about 60,000 Americans every year, is one of the deadliest forms of cancer. After diagnosis, fewer than 10 percent of patients survive for five years.

While some chemotherapies are initially effective, pancreatic tumors often become resistant to them. The disease has also proven difficult to treat with newer approaches such as immunotherapy. However, a team of MIT researchers has now developed an immunotherapy strategy and shown that it can eliminate pancreatic tumors in mice.

The new therapy, which is a combination of three drugs that help boost the body's own immune defenses against tumors, is expected to enter clinical trials later this year.

"We don't have a lot of good options for treating pancreatic cancer. It's a devastating disease clinically," says William Freed-Pastor, a senior postdoc at MIT's Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research. "If this approach led to durable responses in patients, it would make a big impact in at least a subset of patients' lives, but we need to see how it will actually perform in trials."

Freed-Pastor, who is also a medical oncologist at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, is the lead author of the new study, which appears today in Cancer Cell. Tyler Jacks, the David H. Koch Professor of Biology and a member of the Koch Institute, is the paper's senior author.
Probably the worst cancer, just because of how deadly it is
Any progress on that front is welcome
And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future
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Yuli Ban
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For those OOTL, pancreatic cancer has an absurd 10% five-year survival rate
It's basically a death sentence in most cases.

Back in 2011, it was even lower.

Image

Earlier this year, I was showing some symptoms that looked like they could be pancreatic cancer, from the blunt dull pain in my abdomen to a supraclavicular lymph node swelling to loss of appetite that lasted for days on end to, most damningly, elevated liver enzymes. Thankfully it wasn't that, but for about a month-long period back in May and early June, I was fully expecting to be wasting away by now and not even be alive by the end of the year; I was 100% shifting to "I'm going to die, I might as well mentally prepare for it."

For good measure, the pain in my abdomen was mild diverticulitis and has since faded; the lymph node swole from the Moderna vaccine and while it's still there, it's gone done massively and is very soft and rubbery to boot (which is a strong sign against it being cancer; if it was swollen from cancer, it'd be growing and firm); the loss of appetite was ironically from anxiety due to fearing I had cancer.

Conquering pancreatic cancer, or at least bringing its survival rate up to 50%, is basically us defeating cancer as a disease as far as I'm aware. That's one of THE hardest and deadliest to combat outside of very specific niche ones.
And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future
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Yuli Ban wrote: Fri Aug 06, 2021 6:02 am
Earlier this year, I was showing some symptoms that looked like they could be pancreatic cancer, from the blunt dull pain in my abdomen to a supraclavicular lymph node swelling to loss of appetite that lasted for days on end to, most damningly, elevated liver enzymes. Thankfully it wasn't that, but for about a month-long period back in May and early June, I was fully expecting to be wasting away by now and not even be alive by the end of the year; I was 100% shifting to "I'm going to die, I might as well mentally prepare for it."

For good measure, the pain in my abdomen was mild diverticulitis and has since faded; the lymph node swole from the Moderna vaccine and while it's still there, it's gone done massively and is very soft and rubbery to boot (which is a strong sign against it being cancer; if it was swollen from cancer, it'd be growing and firm); the loss of appetite was ironically from anxiety due to fearing I had cancer.

Conquering pancreatic cancer, or at least bringing its survival rate up to 50%, is basically us defeating cancer as a disease as far as I'm aware. That's one of THE hardest and deadliest to combat outside of very specific niche ones.

Christ, that must have been scary. Glad you're better now.

And yeah, pancreatic cancer is the worst. Back in 2011, a colleague (arguably the most popular guy in the office) thought he had jaundice, and took some time off work. A few people were laughing at a photo of him and his yellow-coloured face. I wasn't among those who found it funny, and I remember feeling angry at their reactions. Sure enough, he later revealed his diagnosis of pancreatic cancer. A year later, he sent a video from his hospital bed, looking extremely gaunt and thin.

A few weeks after that, he was dead aged 43.

Always get yourself checked by a doctor if you're worried.
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Cancer vaccine developed using Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine technology

3rd September 2021

Researchers at the University of Oxford and the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research have designed a two-dose therapeutic cancer vaccine using Oxford’s viral vector vaccine technology. The cancer vaccine, which has already been tested in mouse tumour models, has been shown to increase the levels of anti-tumour T cells infiltrating the tumours and improve the efficacy of cancer immunotherapy.

https://www.healtheuropa.eu/cancer-vacc ... gy/110725/
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