Cancer News and Research

Latest Cancer News and Research

Discovery of signaling mechanism may help prevent metastatic melanoma

Researchers at Northwestern University have discovered a key signaling mechanism that may promote the ability of highly aggressive malignant melanoma cells to metastasize, or spread from a primary tumor to distant sites within the body.

1 Nov 2005

Researchers aim to overcome resistance to bowel cancer screening in Scots

Academics are to look at ways to encourage Scots to take part in a new national screening programme for bowel cancer, a leading cause of cancer deaths in Western nations.

1 Nov 2005

Buccal mucosa may help test for lung cancer

In a new study presented at CHEST 2005, the 71st annual international scientific assembly of the American College of Chest Physicians (ACCP), scientists found that buccal mucosa, or cells scraped from the inner part of the cheek, may contain information that separates patients with lung cancer from high-risk negatives

1 Nov 2005

Unique approach to enhance the immune system in patients with breast or colorectal cancer

The study uses a potent immune-enhancing gene delivered directly into the cancer cells to make them look foreign to the body's immune system, which will then attack and destroy the cancer.

1 Nov 2005

First study to confirm the benefit of anti-angiogenic therapy in patients with breast cancer

Results from the first and only interim analysis of an important trial assessing the potential of Herceptin (trastuzumab) to improve disease-free survival (DFS) in HER-2 positive breast cancer patients after adjuvant chemotherapy, have shown that Herceptin affords a significant survival advantage.

1 Nov 2005

Cheeks may hold the clue to lung cancer risk

According to Canadian researchers DNA changes in cells taken from the inside of the cheek are associated with a risk for stage I lung cancer.

1 Nov 2005

Expanded use sought for colon cancer drug

Approval is being sought for a drug designed to treat colon cancer to be used also for the treatment of head and neck cancers.

1 Nov 2005

Colon cancer hits blacks at a younger age

In a review of medical records researchers say that African-Americans are more susceptible to colon cancer at an earlier age than whites.

31 Oct 2005

Gene fusion appears to cause prostate cancer

Scientists at the University of Michigan Medical School, in collaboration with researchers at Harvard's Brigham and Women's Hospital, have discovered a recurring pattern of scrambled chromosomes and abnormal gene activity that occurs only in prostate cancer.

30 Oct 2005

Analytical method to trace the lineage trees of cells

Some fundamental outstanding questions in science - "Where do stem cells originate?" "How does cancer develop?" "When do cell types split off from each other in the embryo?" - might be answered if scientists had a way to map the history of the body's cells going back to the fertilized egg.

30 Oct 2005

Discovery of how communication between cancer cells is controlled

The discovery, by scientists at Monash University and the Sloan Kettering Cancer Centre in New York, of how communication between cancer cells is controlled has promised new treatment options for malignant tumours.

30 Oct 2005

HapMap will give clues to many common diseases

Researchers say that they have completed a map that charts patterns of human genetic variation in the world population, to better understand human biology, evolution and how to diagnose diseases.

27 Oct 2005

Mammograms a big factor in the fight against breast cancer

A new study has come down solidly on the side of routine screening mammograms as a preventative measure in the fight against cancer.

27 Oct 2005

Early detection and improved treatment have contributed almost equally to the substantial decrease in breast cancer

Early detection through screening mammography and improved adjuvant treatment have contributed almost equally to the substantial decrease in breast cancer death rates over the past 10 to 15 years, researchers conclude in an unprecedented effort to parse out the factors that have led to the decline.

27 Oct 2005

More exercise equals lower risk of ischemic stroke

Even in an Asian nation where people generally have higher levels of physical activity on the job than is typical in North America or Europe, those who walk more or engage in regular sports activity tend to have lower levels of ischemic stroke and coronary heart disease

27 Oct 2005

Possible toxic damage from inhaled nanoparticles

A physicist and a medical researcher at the University of Leicester have received a grant of £100,000 from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council to look at possible toxic damage from inhaled nanoparticles used for a range of everyday purposes.

27 Oct 2005

Bouncing helicases possibly play a preventative role in keeping the genome intact

Researchers studying how proteins called helicases travel along strands of DNA have found that when the proteins hit an obstacle they snap back to where they began, repeating the process over and over, possibly playing a preventative role in keeping the genome intact.

27 Oct 2005

Preventing bowel cancer in high risk families

Bowel cancer rates could be reduced by up to 80 per cent in people with a moderate family history of the disease by screening with colonoscopy, according to new research published in the British Medical Journal.

26 Oct 2005

China has become the 89th country to ratify the global tobacco treaty

...the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). Countries that ratify the treaty commit themselves to stringent tobacco control measures, including advertising restrictions, clean indoor air laws, higher tobacco taxes, and bigger warning labels on tobacco packaging.

26 Oct 2005

Way now clear for use of costly breast cancer drug throughout UK

Health managers in the UK have virtually been ordered to pay for the drug Herceptin for women with an aggressive form of breast cancer in its early stages.

26 Oct 2005