Cancer News and Research

Latest Cancer News and Research

Cryoablation effective, safe, durable treatment for prostate cancer

Endocare today announced that 10-year follow-up data from a retrospective study demonstrated that cryoablation as a treatment for prostate cancer has a biochemical disease free survival rate of 77 percent.

14 Mar 2005

Genetic factors may play a significant role in the racial differences encountered in the epidemiology of breast cancer

A new review finds similarities between the clinical presentation and course of breast cancer in Africans and African-Americans, suggesting that genetic factors may play a significant role in the racial differences encountered in the epidemiology of breast cancer in America.

14 Mar 2005

Tumor-targeted immune cells cure prostate cancer without causing systemic immune suppression

In a major breakthrough in cancer gene therapy, a Northwestern University researcher has endowed immune cells with the ability to specifically target metastatic prostate cancer in mice without causing the toxic immune suppression that has been associated with earlier forms of cancer gene therapy.

14 Mar 2005

DNA weak links may provide clues to cancer biology

The chromosomes of mammals, including humans, contain regions that are particularly prone to breaking under conditions of stress and in cancer. Now, new research by geneticists at Duke University Medical Center finds that yeast cells also contain such weak links in DNA and begins to reveal the molecular characteristics of these links that might help to explain them.

13 Mar 2005

New way of looking at MicroRNA and how it controls gene expression

A group of scientists at The Scripps Research Institute is reporting a discovery that sheds light on an area of research fundamental to everything from the normal processes that govern the everyday life of human cells to the aberrant mechanisms that underlie many diseases, including cancer and septic shock.

13 Mar 2005

Protopic and Elidel may cause cancer

Protopic and Elidel, two treatments for eczema approved in 2000 and 2001, have now been found to cause cancer in three different animal species.

13 Mar 2005

Secondhand smoke causes breast cancer

A California agency, the Air Resources Board, which first linked secondhand smoke to heart disease, now says secondhand smoke causes breast cancer too.

10 Mar 2005

Unequal healthcare kills 80,000 black Americans

Former U.S. Surgeon General Dr. David Satcher said this week that over 80,000 black Americans die every year because of disparities in health care. Despite government and public and insurance companies knowledge of this shortchange in health care for blacks, they have done little to improve the situation.

10 Mar 2005

Doctors may in future be able to prevent many cases of deep-vein thrombosis

Doctors may in future be able to prevent many cases of deep-vein thrombosis, commonly referred to as DVT, a disease of the circulation that causes potentially fatal blood clots. It occurs most often in people who have not been able to exercise normally.

9 Mar 2005

Maternal smoking during pregnancy associated with chromosomal abnormalities

A preliminary report suggests that maternal smoking during pregnancy is associated with increased chromosomal abnormalities in fetal cells, according to a study in the current issue of JAMA.

9 Mar 2005

Africa faces potential increases in breast cancer rates

9 Mar 2005

Medicaid enrollment at late stages may partly explain poor outcomes for cancer

A new study concludes that the unavailability of health insurance prior to Medicaid enrollment may contribute to poor outcomes in the Medicaid-insured cancer population.

9 Mar 2005

Telomerase finding has major implications for cancer

UCLA biochemists have determined the three-dimensional structure of a major domain of telomerase, the enzyme that helps maintain telomeres - small pieces of DNA on the ends of chromosomes that act as protective caps - allowing DNA ends to be copied completely when cells are replicated.

9 Mar 2005

Finding may open new horizons for understanding the initiation of chemically induced cancers

A team from the chemistry and biology departments of New York University, in collaboration with Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC), has uncovered a conformational switch - a change in shape in a carcinogen-damaged DNA site - in tumor suppressor genes altered by a known cancer-causing chemical found in cigarette smoke.

9 Mar 2005

New chemotherapy gives hope to brain tumour patients

A large international study conducted by the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) in collaboration with the National Cancer Institute of Canada (NCIC) Clinical Trials Group demonstrated that the addition of a novel chemotherapy agent, Temozolomide (brand name: Temodal®) to radiation therapy increases survival in patients suffering from glioblastoma, a very aggressive form of a brain tumour.

9 Mar 2005

Investigational drug may help prevent recurrence of ovarian cancer

A drug that may help prevent recurrence of ovarian cancer by inhibiting development of new blood vessels essential to cancer growth is under study at the Medical College of Georgia.

9 Mar 2005

Pregnant women who smoke risk their child getting cancer

Smoking has a wide range of possible consequences during and after pregnancy, such as infertility, coagulation problems, obstetric complications such as extrauterine pregnancy and placenta previa, and intrauterine growth retardation, according to background information in a recent study.

8 Mar 2005