Original Story: freep.com
A former head of the Detroit Medical Center who was later charged in one of the largest fraud and corruption investigations in Canadian history has died in custody in Panama.
Dr. Arthur Porter, 59, CEO of DMC from 1999 through 2003, died Wednesday of cancer while under armed guard in a Panama City hospital. The death was announced by Porter's biographer, Jeff Todd, who said the cause was lung cancer that had spread to the bone and liver.
Before his transfer to the hospital this spring, Porter had been in Panama's La Joya Prison following his 2013 arrest in that country on fraud, conspiracy and money laundering charges related to the construction of a $1.3 billion so-called super hospital in Montreal. A Birmingham criminal lawyer is following this story closely.
Porter, who left the DMC to head McGill University's hospital network, was accused of taking as much as $22.5 million in bribes in a kickback scheme for the super hospital's construction contract.
At least seven other individuals also faced criminal charges for the kickback allegations, according to the Montreal Gazette.
The newspaper reported that Porter's extradition to Quebec had been put on hold earlier this year as his lawyer challenged his detention in prison. It does not appear that Porter ever faced trial for the allegations.
A spokeswoman for the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs would not comment Wednesday night on any specifics of Porter's case. A Harrisonburg white collar crime lawyer is experienced in the effective resolution of white collar crime lawsuits as related to business related crimes.
A native of Sierra Leone, Porter was a radiation oncology specialist who became CEO of DMC in May 1999, when the then-struggling hospital system was burning through nearly $100 million a year. Although he slashed thousands of jobs, consolidated hospitals and sold off clinics, DMC was still a money-loser by September 2003, when Porter resigned under pressure.
In a memoir released last year that he wrote while in prison, Porter claimed that in 2001, he received a phone call from President George W. Bush offering him the job of U.S. Surgeon General, according to the Montreal Gazette. Porter declined Bush's offer.
Porter left the U.S. in 2004 to become executive director of McGill University's hospital network. In 2008, he was named to a seat on Canada's spy agency watchdog committee, gaining access to Canadian state secrets.
At the time of Porter's arrest in 2013, DMC officials told the Free Press that he was never suspected or accused of any wrongdoing during his years in Detroit. He arrived in Detroit in 1991 as a member of the radiation oncology department at the DMC-affiliated Wayne State University School of Medicine.
"We certainly didn't see any behavior that would have caused us to believe he was involved in improper activities," a former DMC board member, Stephen D'Arcy, said at the time. "It's almost bizarre the kinds of things he was involved in apparently in Canada."
A DMC spokesperson could not be reached for comment late Wednesday.
According to Porter's biographer, Porter was forced to smuggle chemotherapy drugs into prison to keep himself alive and, despite repeated letters to the Canadian embassy in Panama for better medical care, wasn't granted access to cancer treatment until this year.
He spent his final days on high doses of morphine for the pain, his biographer wrote in a statement posted online.
The Montreal Gazette reported that Porter's wife pleaded guilty in December to money laundering and was sentenced to two years in prison. A San Francisco corporate lawyer represents clients in corporate criminal charges and corporate finance cases.
In attempts to recover $17.5 million of the $22.5 million that was allegedly defrauded, Quebec authorities have seized properties belonging to Porter and his family in Michigan, Florida and the Caribbean and bank accounts in the U.S. and other countries, the newspaper said.
Showing posts with label Cancer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cancer. Show all posts
18 February 2013
Alcohol Raises Risk of Cancer
Story first appeared on SFGate -
Even moderate alcohol use may substantially raise the risk of dying from cancer, according to a study released Thursday offering the first comprehensive update of alcohol-related cancer deaths in decades.
"People don't talk about the issue of alcohol and cancer risk," said Dr. David Nelson, director of the Cancer Prevention Fellowship Program at the National Cancer Institute and lead author of the study.
"Alcohol has been known to be related to causing cancer for a long period of time. We talk about cancer prevention, screenings and tests. This is one of those things that seems to be missing in plain sight."
Alcohol use accounts for about 3.5 percent of all U.S. cancer deaths annually, according to the study. The majority of deaths seemed to occur among people who consumed more than three alcoholic drinks a day, but those who consumed 1.5 beverages daily may account for up to a third of those deaths, the researchers found.
In 2009, 18,000 to 21,000 people in the United States died of alcohol-related cancers, from cancer of the liver to breast cancer and other types, the researchers said. That's more than the number of people in the United States who die every year of melanoma (9,000 in 2009) or ovarian cancer (14,000 in 2009).
Reasons Unclear
How alcohol contributes to cancer is not fully understood, the study notes. Previous research has shown alcohol appears to work in different ways to increase cancer risk, such as affecting estrogen levels in women and acting as a solvent to help tobacco chemicals get into the digestive tract.
The study, published in the American Journal of Public Health, is the first major analysis of alcohol-attributable cancer deaths in more than 30 years. Researchers said the lack of recent research on the subject may contribute to a lack of public awareness of cancer risks.
"People are well aware of other risks, like the impact of tobacco on cancer, and are not as aware alcohol plays quite a bit of a role," said Thomas Greenfield, one of the study's authors and scientific director of Public Health Institute's Alcohol Research Group in Emeryville.
Researchers examined seven types of cancers known to be linked to alcohol use: cancers of the mouth and pharynx, larynx, esophagus, liver, colon, rectum and female breast. To link the cancer to alcohol use, they relied on surveys of more than 220,000 adults, 2009 U.S. mortality data, and sales data on alcohol consumption.
Breast cancer accounted for the most common alcohol-related cancer deaths among women, with alcohol contributing to 15 percent of all breast cancer deaths. Among men, cancers of the mouth, pharynx, larynx and esophagus accounted for the most alcohol-linked cancer deaths.
The study drew some criticism. Dr. Curtis Ellison, professor of medicine and public health at Boston University School of Medicine, said the study failed to take into account several important factors, such as the pattern of drinking rather than just the amount of alcohol consumed. He said consuming small, consistent amounts of alcohol is much healthier than occasional binge drinking.
Individualized Advice
"They're mixing alcohol abuse, which leads to all of these cancers as they've clearly shown, with the casual drinker, where the risk is very small," said Ellison, also co-director of the International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research.
Dr. Arthur Klatsky, adjunct investigator at the Kaiser Permanente Northern California Division of Research, said many studies have shown moderate drinkers in older age groups may be healthier than those who abstain. Klatsky has long researched the effects of alcohol on health but declined to comment directly on the study because he had not yet read it.
"Advice needs to be individualized," Klatsky said. "The advice one would give to 60-year-old man who has no problem with alcohol but is at high risk of heart disease due to family history is quite different than the advice we give to a 25-year-old woman whose mother died of breast cancer."
The study's authors acknowledged alcohol can have health benefits but said alcohol causes 10 times as many deaths as it prevents. There's no known safe level of drinking, they said.
"The safest level for cancer prevention is that people don't expose themselves to any potential risk," said Nelson of the National Cancer Institute. "The bottom line means for people who choose to drink, their cancer risk will be lower if they drink lower amounts."
Alcohol Use Tied To Deaths
A study released Thursday by the American Journal of Public Health found:
Even moderate alcohol use may substantially raise the risk of dying from cancer, according to a study released Thursday offering the first comprehensive update of alcohol-related cancer deaths in decades.
"People don't talk about the issue of alcohol and cancer risk," said Dr. David Nelson, director of the Cancer Prevention Fellowship Program at the National Cancer Institute and lead author of the study.
"Alcohol has been known to be related to causing cancer for a long period of time. We talk about cancer prevention, screenings and tests. This is one of those things that seems to be missing in plain sight."
Alcohol use accounts for about 3.5 percent of all U.S. cancer deaths annually, according to the study. The majority of deaths seemed to occur among people who consumed more than three alcoholic drinks a day, but those who consumed 1.5 beverages daily may account for up to a third of those deaths, the researchers found.
In 2009, 18,000 to 21,000 people in the United States died of alcohol-related cancers, from cancer of the liver to breast cancer and other types, the researchers said. That's more than the number of people in the United States who die every year of melanoma (9,000 in 2009) or ovarian cancer (14,000 in 2009).
Reasons Unclear
How alcohol contributes to cancer is not fully understood, the study notes. Previous research has shown alcohol appears to work in different ways to increase cancer risk, such as affecting estrogen levels in women and acting as a solvent to help tobacco chemicals get into the digestive tract.
The study, published in the American Journal of Public Health, is the first major analysis of alcohol-attributable cancer deaths in more than 30 years. Researchers said the lack of recent research on the subject may contribute to a lack of public awareness of cancer risks.
"People are well aware of other risks, like the impact of tobacco on cancer, and are not as aware alcohol plays quite a bit of a role," said Thomas Greenfield, one of the study's authors and scientific director of Public Health Institute's Alcohol Research Group in Emeryville.
Researchers examined seven types of cancers known to be linked to alcohol use: cancers of the mouth and pharynx, larynx, esophagus, liver, colon, rectum and female breast. To link the cancer to alcohol use, they relied on surveys of more than 220,000 adults, 2009 U.S. mortality data, and sales data on alcohol consumption.
Breast cancer accounted for the most common alcohol-related cancer deaths among women, with alcohol contributing to 15 percent of all breast cancer deaths. Among men, cancers of the mouth, pharynx, larynx and esophagus accounted for the most alcohol-linked cancer deaths.
The study drew some criticism. Dr. Curtis Ellison, professor of medicine and public health at Boston University School of Medicine, said the study failed to take into account several important factors, such as the pattern of drinking rather than just the amount of alcohol consumed. He said consuming small, consistent amounts of alcohol is much healthier than occasional binge drinking.
Individualized Advice
"They're mixing alcohol abuse, which leads to all of these cancers as they've clearly shown, with the casual drinker, where the risk is very small," said Ellison, also co-director of the International Scientific Forum on Alcohol Research.
Dr. Arthur Klatsky, adjunct investigator at the Kaiser Permanente Northern California Division of Research, said many studies have shown moderate drinkers in older age groups may be healthier than those who abstain. Klatsky has long researched the effects of alcohol on health but declined to comment directly on the study because he had not yet read it.
"Advice needs to be individualized," Klatsky said. "The advice one would give to 60-year-old man who has no problem with alcohol but is at high risk of heart disease due to family history is quite different than the advice we give to a 25-year-old woman whose mother died of breast cancer."
The study's authors acknowledged alcohol can have health benefits but said alcohol causes 10 times as many deaths as it prevents. There's no known safe level of drinking, they said.
"The safest level for cancer prevention is that people don't expose themselves to any potential risk," said Nelson of the National Cancer Institute. "The bottom line means for people who choose to drink, their cancer risk will be lower if they drink lower amounts."
Alcohol Use Tied To Deaths
A study released Thursday by the American Journal of Public Health found:
- Total deaths: Alcohol use accounts for 3.5 percent of all U.S. cancer deaths, or between 18,000 and 21,000 deaths a year.
- Lost years: About 18 years of potential life are lost per cancer death. That means a person who died at age 60 from alcohol-related cancer would have otherwise probably lived to 78.
- Number of drinks: The majority of alcohol-related cancer deaths occurred among those who drank more than three alcoholic beverages a day, but about 30 percent occurred in those who drank less than 1.5 drinks a day.
19 November 2012
Study Shows Health Benefits of Reflexology
story first appeared on freep.com
Reflexology -- the method of massaging the feet to stimulate parts of the body -- can help cancer patients perform daily tasks better.
That's the conclusion of a new study led by Michigan State University researcher Gwen Wyatt, a professor in the College of Nursing.
The study, funded by the National Cancer Institute, is believed to be the first large-scale study to put hard science behind the benefits of reflexology as a complement to standard cancer care,
"It's always been assumed that it's a nice comfort measure, but to this point we really have not, in a rigorous way, documented the benefits," Wyatt said in a report released by the MSU today. "This is the first step toward moving a complementary therapy from fringe care to mainstream care."
People who received the reflexology treatment had significantly less shortness of breath and were able to more easily perform such tasks as climbing stairs, getting dressed and going grocery shopping, according to the MSU report.
Over an 11-week period, they compared the reflexology group with a group that had regular foot massage and a group that had neither foot massage nor reflexology. The study involved 385 women undergoing chemotherapy or hormonal therapy for advanced-stage breast cancer that had spread beyond the breast. The women were assigned randomly to three groups: Some received treatment by a certified reflexologist, others got a foot massage meant to act like a placebo, and the rest had only standard medical treatment and no foot manipulation.
Wyatt is now researching whether massage similar to reflexology performed by cancer patients' friends and family, as opposed to certified reflexologists, might be a simple and inexpensive treatment option.
Reflexology -- the method of massaging the feet to stimulate parts of the body -- can help cancer patients perform daily tasks better.
That's the conclusion of a new study led by Michigan State University researcher Gwen Wyatt, a professor in the College of Nursing.
The study, funded by the National Cancer Institute, is believed to be the first large-scale study to put hard science behind the benefits of reflexology as a complement to standard cancer care,
"It's always been assumed that it's a nice comfort measure, but to this point we really have not, in a rigorous way, documented the benefits," Wyatt said in a report released by the MSU today. "This is the first step toward moving a complementary therapy from fringe care to mainstream care."
People who received the reflexology treatment had significantly less shortness of breath and were able to more easily perform such tasks as climbing stairs, getting dressed and going grocery shopping, according to the MSU report.
Over an 11-week period, they compared the reflexology group with a group that had regular foot massage and a group that had neither foot massage nor reflexology. The study involved 385 women undergoing chemotherapy or hormonal therapy for advanced-stage breast cancer that had spread beyond the breast. The women were assigned randomly to three groups: Some received treatment by a certified reflexologist, others got a foot massage meant to act like a placebo, and the rest had only standard medical treatment and no foot manipulation.
Wyatt is now researching whether massage similar to reflexology performed by cancer patients' friends and family, as opposed to certified reflexologists, might be a simple and inexpensive treatment option.
Experimental Breast Cancer Treatment Proving Beneficial
story first appeared on usatoday.com
Vickie Baker did not have time for breast cancer.
The 49-year-old Hazard resident knew she needed radiation therapy, but she couldn't imagine how she could get to University Hospital in Louisville for treatments five days a week. Not when she lives more than three hours away and babysits eight grandchildren.
But a University of Louisville study allowed her to receive radiation treatment just once a week in March and April, after a lumpectomy in January.
Baker, who is doing well today, said the experimental treatment for people with early stage breast cancer made her life easier and offered hope for the future.
Dr. Anthony Dragun, a radiation oncologist at the University of Louisville's James Graham Brown Cancer Center who is overseeing the study, hopes it will make radiation treatment more accessible to women facing such obstacles as distance, transportation problems and time constraints — while also cutting treatment costs by more than half.
Research subjects get higher doses of radiation once weekly than they would receive during each daily treatment, but less radiation during the overall five-week course of treatment. Traditional daily radiation schedules are also usually five weeks, but in some cases may be six or seven weeks.
Vickie Baker did not have time for breast cancer.
The 49-year-old Hazard resident knew she needed radiation therapy, but she couldn't imagine how she could get to University Hospital in Louisville for treatments five days a week. Not when she lives more than three hours away and babysits eight grandchildren.
But a University of Louisville study allowed her to receive radiation treatment just once a week in March and April, after a lumpectomy in January.
Baker, who is doing well today, said the experimental treatment for people with early stage breast cancer made her life easier and offered hope for the future.
Dr. Anthony Dragun, a radiation oncologist at the University of Louisville's James Graham Brown Cancer Center who is overseeing the study, hopes it will make radiation treatment more accessible to women facing such obstacles as distance, transportation problems and time constraints — while also cutting treatment costs by more than half.
Research subjects get higher doses of radiation once weekly than they would receive during each daily treatment, but less radiation during the overall five-week course of treatment. Traditional daily radiation schedules are also usually five weeks, but in some cases may be six or seven weeks.
Some areas of the country have better access to this type of treatment. A Cancer Specialist Detroit procedure might be available in areas less rural than in Appalachia.
Dragun led a study two years ago showing that about a third of Kentucky women with early stage breast cancer didn't get recommended radiation treatments after lumpectomy surgeries.
Among those least likely to get radiation were the elderly, African Americans and women in rural areas, including the Appalachian region of the state.
Women who did not get recommended radiation were 60% more likely to die during the time they were studied.
Dragun said that many times studies like these are published but never followed through to the next step, but made sure that wasn't the case here.
He said he's hopeful about the new regimen. In his study and previous European studies, women getting weekly radiation report similar levels of side effects as those getting radiation five days a week.
Some outside experts say the approach seems promising, but one pointed to research that found drawbacks in terms of breast appearance after once-a-week treatments.
Baker, who is scheduled for a follow-up doctor visit later this month, said she's glad to play a part in advancing the science.
Dragun's study targets women with breast cancer in Stages 0-II who have undergone lumpectomies and who may be getting chemotherapy or hormonal therapy.
He said the experimental regimen not only improves access to care, but also significantly reduces treatment costs as measured by Medicare reimbursement. Five weekly treatments total $2,901, compared with $6,884 for 25 daily treatments over five weeks.
And that doesn't count such costs as increased medical staff time for the more frequent treatments, and wear-and-tear on the linear accelerator that provides the radiation.
Dragun said it is less costly for the health care system, and added that it also saves patients money on transportation and potential expenses such as overnight stays near cancer centers.
But Dragun said the biggest benefit is improving access to care — which can potentially save lives, while also giving patients more time with their families and less time off of work.
Baker said distance was a big obstacle for her after doctors found a lump in her right breast on a mammogram in 2011 and her family physician referred her to University.
After the lumpectomy in January, she didn't hesitate to join Dragun's research.
Baker said she and family members drove to Louisville each week, returning to Hazard the same day. Noting that she frequently takes care of her grandchildren, she predicted that, if the only option were daily radiation treatments, she would simply have skipped some.
Baker is one of 90 patients who have joined the study, which opened in January 2011 and aims to enroll 250 patients.
An article on the results among the first 42 patients has been accepted for publication in the International Journal of Radiation Oncology, and it concludes that women's tolerance of the weekly radiation compares well with recent reports of daily schedules, and the new regimen appears feasible and cost-effective.
Dr. Bruce Haffty, associate director of the Cancer Institute of New Jersey and president-elect of the American Society for Radiation Oncology, said he's aware of Dragun's research, which is one of several alternatives to daily, five-week radiation regimens being studied right now.
Haffty said radiation technology has grown more sophisticated, and such pared-down treatment schedules may someday help patients with long distances to travel.
If weekly regimens do become common, Dragun said they could be particularly helpful in such places as Kentucky, a largely rural state beset by doctor shortages, high levels of poverty and cancer disparities.
In his previous study, he and his colleagues analyzed the radiation rates for 11,914 women who underwent lumpectomies for early breast cancer, and found the percentages who didn't get radiation were 47.5% for women 70 or older, compared with 28.9% for those under 50; 43.8% for Appalachian women, compared with 30.4 for non-Appalachian women, and 35.4% for black women, compared with 33.6% for white women.
The study found that women without private health insurance fared worse. Among uninsured women, 34.4% didn't get radiation, compared with 27.8% for those with insurance, 34.5% for those with Medicaid and 42.1% for those with Medicare.
Dr. LaQuandra Nesbitt, director of the Louisville Metro Department of Public Health and Wellness, said some people believe that breast-cancer disparities could be eliminated simply by making screenings more available.
But she said the problem is much more complicated, considering big issues with access to care, timeliness of care and quality of treatment for cancer.
She said even the issue of transportation isn't as simple as it seems. In rural areas, public transportation is often scarce.
Nesbitt said new treatment schedules such as the one Dragun is studying could help — not only by reducing the number of commutes but also by improving women's quality of life.
Dragun said if his results hold up, the new treatment regimen eventually could help all early stage breast cancer patients who need radiation because less frequent treatments would be a boon to any woman juggling work and child-rearing.
Dragun led a study two years ago showing that about a third of Kentucky women with early stage breast cancer didn't get recommended radiation treatments after lumpectomy surgeries.
Among those least likely to get radiation were the elderly, African Americans and women in rural areas, including the Appalachian region of the state.
Women who did not get recommended radiation were 60% more likely to die during the time they were studied.
Dragun said that many times studies like these are published but never followed through to the next step, but made sure that wasn't the case here.
He said he's hopeful about the new regimen. In his study and previous European studies, women getting weekly radiation report similar levels of side effects as those getting radiation five days a week.
Some outside experts say the approach seems promising, but one pointed to research that found drawbacks in terms of breast appearance after once-a-week treatments.
Baker, who is scheduled for a follow-up doctor visit later this month, said she's glad to play a part in advancing the science.
Less trips, money
Dragun's study targets women with breast cancer in Stages 0-II who have undergone lumpectomies and who may be getting chemotherapy or hormonal therapy.
He said the experimental regimen not only improves access to care, but also significantly reduces treatment costs as measured by Medicare reimbursement. Five weekly treatments total $2,901, compared with $6,884 for 25 daily treatments over five weeks.
And that doesn't count such costs as increased medical staff time for the more frequent treatments, and wear-and-tear on the linear accelerator that provides the radiation.
Dragun said it is less costly for the health care system, and added that it also saves patients money on transportation and potential expenses such as overnight stays near cancer centers.
But Dragun said the biggest benefit is improving access to care — which can potentially save lives, while also giving patients more time with their families and less time off of work.
Baker said distance was a big obstacle for her after doctors found a lump in her right breast on a mammogram in 2011 and her family physician referred her to University.
After the lumpectomy in January, she didn't hesitate to join Dragun's research.
Baker said she and family members drove to Louisville each week, returning to Hazard the same day. Noting that she frequently takes care of her grandchildren, she predicted that, if the only option were daily radiation treatments, she would simply have skipped some.
Baker is one of 90 patients who have joined the study, which opened in January 2011 and aims to enroll 250 patients.
An article on the results among the first 42 patients has been accepted for publication in the International Journal of Radiation Oncology, and it concludes that women's tolerance of the weekly radiation compares well with recent reports of daily schedules, and the new regimen appears feasible and cost-effective.
Dr. Bruce Haffty, associate director of the Cancer Institute of New Jersey and president-elect of the American Society for Radiation Oncology, said he's aware of Dragun's research, which is one of several alternatives to daily, five-week radiation regimens being studied right now.
Haffty said radiation technology has grown more sophisticated, and such pared-down treatment schedules may someday help patients with long distances to travel.
Unequal treatment
If weekly regimens do become common, Dragun said they could be particularly helpful in such places as Kentucky, a largely rural state beset by doctor shortages, high levels of poverty and cancer disparities.
In his previous study, he and his colleagues analyzed the radiation rates for 11,914 women who underwent lumpectomies for early breast cancer, and found the percentages who didn't get radiation were 47.5% for women 70 or older, compared with 28.9% for those under 50; 43.8% for Appalachian women, compared with 30.4 for non-Appalachian women, and 35.4% for black women, compared with 33.6% for white women.
The study found that women without private health insurance fared worse. Among uninsured women, 34.4% didn't get radiation, compared with 27.8% for those with insurance, 34.5% for those with Medicaid and 42.1% for those with Medicare.
Dr. LaQuandra Nesbitt, director of the Louisville Metro Department of Public Health and Wellness, said some people believe that breast-cancer disparities could be eliminated simply by making screenings more available.
But she said the problem is much more complicated, considering big issues with access to care, timeliness of care and quality of treatment for cancer.
She said even the issue of transportation isn't as simple as it seems. In rural areas, public transportation is often scarce.
Nesbitt said new treatment schedules such as the one Dragun is studying could help — not only by reducing the number of commutes but also by improving women's quality of life.
Dragun said if his results hold up, the new treatment regimen eventually could help all early stage breast cancer patients who need radiation because less frequent treatments would be a boon to any woman juggling work and child-rearing.
05 June 2012
Immune Drug A Success in Trials
Story first appeared in USA Today.
The early success of an experimental drug from Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. that’s designed to unleash the body’s immune-system defenses against cancer sets the stage for an industry wide race to produce similar treatments.
The drug shrank tumors in people with advanced lung, kidney and skin cancer in 18 percent to 28 percent of patients, depending on the illness, who had failed on other therapies, according to data from a 296-patient trial reported June 2 at the American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting in Chicago.
The findings hint that therapies like the Bristol drug, that prompt killer T-cells to eliminate invaders, may work against many tumors.
There is no reason to think that all cancers might not be susceptible to immune therapy. The human immune system can wipe out whole organs when it rejects a transplant.
Drugmakers and scientists have been trying to find ways to boost the immune system against cancer for decades, with little successes until recently.
In 2010, Dendreon Corp. (DNDN)’s Provenge, a prostate cancer treatment, was approved in the U.S. as the first therapy designed to train the body’s immune system to attack tumor cells as if they were a virus. Last year, Bristol-Myers immune boosting antibody Yervoy was approved for advanced melanoma.
Now the whole idea of immunotherapy is really blossoming. It is going to be the next wave in cancer treatments.
Pioneering Work
In the 1990s, an immunologist did pioneering work that led to Yervoy. At that point, many researchers were skeptical that the concept would work in people. Just a few years ago, when he gave talks to doctors at cancer meetings, the room would only be half full, he said.
At the weekend’s oncology conference he discussed data from Bristol’s trial and studies of competing immune drugs in a hall packed with researchers, doctors, and industry officials.
Bristol-Myers’s Yervoy was a milestone for the New York- based company, the first drug proven to extend the survival of advanced melanoma patients. The therapy blocks a molecular off- switch on the immune cells that keeps them from attacking cancer. It has been shown in studies to shrink melanoma in 10 percent to 15 percent of patients.
The newest Bristol drug, BMS-936558, is an antibody that blocks a different immune system off-switch, called PD-1. Many types of tumors act to keep the off-switch in place to protect themselves from the immune system.
Lung, Kidney, Skin Cancer
Results from the company-sponsored trial reported at the cancer meeting showed Bristol-Myers’s anti-PD-1 drug shrank tumors in 18 percent of lung cancer patients, 27 percent of kidney cancer patients and 28 percent of melanoma patients.
Based on the findings, Bristol-Myers plans to begin a final set of trials of the treatment in lung and kidney cancer this year, and in melanoma by early next year.
Immune therapy will become a new paradigm in the way cancers are treated.
‘Teach Your Body’
A doctor at Yale Cancer Center in New Haven, Connecticut, gave a patient with spreading lung cancer her a choice of two experimental drug trials, including the Bristol anti-PD-1 drug that might “teach your body to recognize cancer.” She chose the PD-1 drug and, within two months, her tumors started to shrink.
They have remained under control ever since then. The remaining lesions may just be dead tissue.
Potential rivals to Bristol-Myers include Merck & Co. (MRK), Roche Holding AG (ROG), Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (TEVA) and GlaxoSmithKline Plc (GSK), all of which are in early stages of testing drugs that work by similar mechanisms.
The new class of drugs is definitely a revolution in the making.
Year-Long Response
A promising aspect of new immune-boosting therapies is that they may work for long periods of time, said a professor of surgery and oncology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore and a lead author on the study.
According to the results, 20 patients on the Bristol-Myers PD-1 drug had tumor responses that have lasted a year or more. This stands in contrast to existing drugs that hit mutated genes on cancer cells. These often stop working in a matter of months as the tumors become resistant, Topalian said in a phone interview before the meeting.
Some patients who responded to BMS-936558 have now gone off therapy without their tumors regrowing.
The immune system has a memory component that continues to hold to the tumor in check even after therapy is stopped.
Potential Downside
A downside of boosting the immune system against cancer is that it may also attack normal tissue. Three patients in the trial died from lung inflammation linked to the drug, according to the results.
There haven’t been any deaths since Bristol started a program to aggressively treat patients who showed signs of the lung inflammation.
In addition to lung, kidney and melanoma patients, the Bristol-Myers drug trial also included people with advanced colon cancer and prostate cancer. None of those patients experienced major tumor shrinkage, for reasons that aren’t clear.
The early success of an experimental drug from Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. that’s designed to unleash the body’s immune-system defenses against cancer sets the stage for an industry wide race to produce similar treatments.
The drug shrank tumors in people with advanced lung, kidney and skin cancer in 18 percent to 28 percent of patients, depending on the illness, who had failed on other therapies, according to data from a 296-patient trial reported June 2 at the American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting in Chicago.
The findings hint that therapies like the Bristol drug, that prompt killer T-cells to eliminate invaders, may work against many tumors.
There is no reason to think that all cancers might not be susceptible to immune therapy. The human immune system can wipe out whole organs when it rejects a transplant.
Drugmakers and scientists have been trying to find ways to boost the immune system against cancer for decades, with little successes until recently.
In 2010, Dendreon Corp. (DNDN)’s Provenge, a prostate cancer treatment, was approved in the U.S. as the first therapy designed to train the body’s immune system to attack tumor cells as if they were a virus. Last year, Bristol-Myers immune boosting antibody Yervoy was approved for advanced melanoma.
Now the whole idea of immunotherapy is really blossoming. It is going to be the next wave in cancer treatments.
Pioneering Work
In the 1990s, an immunologist did pioneering work that led to Yervoy. At that point, many researchers were skeptical that the concept would work in people. Just a few years ago, when he gave talks to doctors at cancer meetings, the room would only be half full, he said.
At the weekend’s oncology conference he discussed data from Bristol’s trial and studies of competing immune drugs in a hall packed with researchers, doctors, and industry officials.
Bristol-Myers’s Yervoy was a milestone for the New York- based company, the first drug proven to extend the survival of advanced melanoma patients. The therapy blocks a molecular off- switch on the immune cells that keeps them from attacking cancer. It has been shown in studies to shrink melanoma in 10 percent to 15 percent of patients.
The newest Bristol drug, BMS-936558, is an antibody that blocks a different immune system off-switch, called PD-1. Many types of tumors act to keep the off-switch in place to protect themselves from the immune system.
Lung, Kidney, Skin Cancer
Results from the company-sponsored trial reported at the cancer meeting showed Bristol-Myers’s anti-PD-1 drug shrank tumors in 18 percent of lung cancer patients, 27 percent of kidney cancer patients and 28 percent of melanoma patients.
Based on the findings, Bristol-Myers plans to begin a final set of trials of the treatment in lung and kidney cancer this year, and in melanoma by early next year.
Immune therapy will become a new paradigm in the way cancers are treated.
‘Teach Your Body’
A doctor at Yale Cancer Center in New Haven, Connecticut, gave a patient with spreading lung cancer her a choice of two experimental drug trials, including the Bristol anti-PD-1 drug that might “teach your body to recognize cancer.” She chose the PD-1 drug and, within two months, her tumors started to shrink.
They have remained under control ever since then. The remaining lesions may just be dead tissue.
Potential rivals to Bristol-Myers include Merck & Co. (MRK), Roche Holding AG (ROG), Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (TEVA) and GlaxoSmithKline Plc (GSK), all of which are in early stages of testing drugs that work by similar mechanisms.
The new class of drugs is definitely a revolution in the making.
Year-Long Response
A promising aspect of new immune-boosting therapies is that they may work for long periods of time, said a professor of surgery and oncology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore and a lead author on the study.
According to the results, 20 patients on the Bristol-Myers PD-1 drug had tumor responses that have lasted a year or more. This stands in contrast to existing drugs that hit mutated genes on cancer cells. These often stop working in a matter of months as the tumors become resistant, Topalian said in a phone interview before the meeting.
Some patients who responded to BMS-936558 have now gone off therapy without their tumors regrowing.
The immune system has a memory component that continues to hold to the tumor in check even after therapy is stopped.
Potential Downside
A downside of boosting the immune system against cancer is that it may also attack normal tissue. Three patients in the trial died from lung inflammation linked to the drug, according to the results.
There haven’t been any deaths since Bristol started a program to aggressively treat patients who showed signs of the lung inflammation.
In addition to lung, kidney and melanoma patients, the Bristol-Myers drug trial also included people with advanced colon cancer and prostate cancer. None of those patients experienced major tumor shrinkage, for reasons that aren’t clear.
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07 May 2012
Breast Cancer Deadly for Men
Story first appeared in The Detroit News.
Men rarely get breast cancer, but those who do often don't survive as long as women, largely because they don't even realize they can get it and are slow to recognize the warning signs, researchers say.
On average, women with breast cancer lived two years longer than men in the biggest study yet of the disease in males.
The study found that men's breast tumors were larger at diagnosis, more advanced and more likely to have spread to other parts of the body. Men were also diagnosed later in life; in the study, they were 63 on average, versus 59 for women.
Many men have no idea that they can get breast cancer, and some doctors are in the dark, too, dismissing symptoms that would be an automatic red flag in women.
The American Cancer Society estimates 1 in 1,000 men will get breast cancer, versus 1 in 8 women. By comparison, 1 in 6 men will get prostate cancer, the most common cancer in men.
It's not been on the radar screen to think about breast cancer in men. The researchers analyzed 10 years of national data on breast cancer cases, from 1998 to 2007. A total of 13,457 male patients diagnosed during those years were included, versus 1.4 million women. The database contains 75 percent of all U.S. breast cancer cases.
The men who were studied lived an average of about eight years after being diagnosed, compared with more than 10 years for women. The study doesn't indicate whether patients died of breast cancer or something else.
There are no formal guidelines for detecting breast cancer in men.
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Men rarely get breast cancer, but those who do often don't survive as long as women, largely because they don't even realize they can get it and are slow to recognize the warning signs, researchers say.
On average, women with breast cancer lived two years longer than men in the biggest study yet of the disease in males.
The study found that men's breast tumors were larger at diagnosis, more advanced and more likely to have spread to other parts of the body. Men were also diagnosed later in life; in the study, they were 63 on average, versus 59 for women.
Many men have no idea that they can get breast cancer, and some doctors are in the dark, too, dismissing symptoms that would be an automatic red flag in women.
The American Cancer Society estimates 1 in 1,000 men will get breast cancer, versus 1 in 8 women. By comparison, 1 in 6 men will get prostate cancer, the most common cancer in men.
It's not been on the radar screen to think about breast cancer in men. The researchers analyzed 10 years of national data on breast cancer cases, from 1998 to 2007. A total of 13,457 male patients diagnosed during those years were included, versus 1.4 million women. The database contains 75 percent of all U.S. breast cancer cases.
The men who were studied lived an average of about eight years after being diagnosed, compared with more than 10 years for women. The study doesn't indicate whether patients died of breast cancer or something else.
There are no formal guidelines for detecting breast cancer in men.
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20 April 2012
New Treatments for Prostrate Cancer
Story first appeared in The New York Daily News.
A new prostate cancer treatment using high frequency sound waves may be a viable alternative to surgery and radiotherapy with less chance of incontinence or impotence, researchers said Tuesday.
A clinical trial funded by Britain's Medical Research Council examined the efficacy of a new treatment known as high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU), that can target areas just a few millimetres in size.
The results show that 12 months after treatment, none of the 41 men in the trial had incontinence of urine and just 1 in 10 suffered from poor erections - both common side effects of conventional treatment. The majority of men (95 per cent) were also cancer-free after a year.
The findings were published in the journal Lancet Oncology.
Treatment involves radiotherapy or removing the prostate surgically -- both methods that can damage surrounding healthy tissue, in some cases leading to incontinence or erectile dysfunction.
HIFU targets a small area affected by cancer -- the sound waves causing the tissue to vibrate and heat up, killing the cancer cells.
The procedure is done under general anesthetic and most patients are back home within 24 hours.
Doctors are optimistic that men diagnosed with prostate cancer may soon be able to undergo a day case surgical procedure, which can be safely repeated once or twice, to treat their condition with very few side-effects. That could mean a significant improvement in their quality of life.
There will be a larger trial to examine whether the new therapy, already in use in hospitals for several years, was as effective as the standard treatment.
See also this video and article documenting an alternate method of prostrate cancer treatment used by the Detroit Medical Center.
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A new prostate cancer treatment using high frequency sound waves may be a viable alternative to surgery and radiotherapy with less chance of incontinence or impotence, researchers said Tuesday.
A clinical trial funded by Britain's Medical Research Council examined the efficacy of a new treatment known as high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU), that can target areas just a few millimetres in size.
The results show that 12 months after treatment, none of the 41 men in the trial had incontinence of urine and just 1 in 10 suffered from poor erections - both common side effects of conventional treatment. The majority of men (95 per cent) were also cancer-free after a year.
The findings were published in the journal Lancet Oncology.
Treatment involves radiotherapy or removing the prostate surgically -- both methods that can damage surrounding healthy tissue, in some cases leading to incontinence or erectile dysfunction.
HIFU targets a small area affected by cancer -- the sound waves causing the tissue to vibrate and heat up, killing the cancer cells.
The procedure is done under general anesthetic and most patients are back home within 24 hours.
Doctors are optimistic that men diagnosed with prostate cancer may soon be able to undergo a day case surgical procedure, which can be safely repeated once or twice, to treat their condition with very few side-effects. That could mean a significant improvement in their quality of life.
There will be a larger trial to examine whether the new therapy, already in use in hospitals for several years, was as effective as the standard treatment.
See also this video and article documenting an alternate method of prostrate cancer treatment used by the Detroit Medical Center.
For more healthcare and medical related news, visit the Healthcare and Medical blog.
For national and worldwide related business news, visit the Peak News Room blog.
For local and Michigan business related news, visit the Michigan Business News blog.
For law related news, visit the Nation of Law blog.
For real estate and home related news, visit the Commercial and Residential Real Estate blog.
For technology and electronics related news, visit the Electronics America blog.
For organic SEO and web optimization related news, visit the SEO Done Right blog.
29 March 2012
Cases of Cancers Linked With Obesity Increase
Story first appeared in the Wall Street Journal.
Several cancers linked to obesity and a sedentary lifestyle rose
every year from 1999 through 2008, even as improved screening and a sharp
decline in the number of smokers have helped push down the rate of new cancer
diagnoses overall across the U.S., according to a report released Wednesday.
Rates of cancers of the kidney, pancreas, lower esophagus and
uterus increased annually through 2008, the latest data available, according to
the Annual Report to the Nation on the Status of Cancer. Rates of breast cancer
in women at least 50 years old declined 1.3% annually from 1999 to 2005 but
rose slightly between 2005 and 2008.
The data add to a growing body of evidence that obesity raises the
risk of these and some other cancers. As many as one-third of common cancers in
industrialized nations are linked to excess weight and lack of physical
activity, according to the International Agency for Research on Cancer. Obesity
rates leveled off in the U.S. a decade ago, but an estimated 68.8% of adults
remain overweight or obese, according to the CDC, and cancers can take years to
develop.
Obesity-related cancers include common ones, such as breast and
colorectal cancer, as well as less common ones, such as pancreatic cancer.
Excess weight can also decrease the chance of survival once a patient is
diagnosed.
The report, published online Wednesday in the journal Cancer, is
by researchers from the CDC, the North American Association of Central Cancer
Registries, the National Cancer Institute, and the American Cancer Society.
The evidence of a causal link with cancer, while not yet
definitive, is far clearer with excess weight and lack of physical activity
than with specific foods or nutrients.
The rising rates contrast with the progress made in recent years
against major killers such as lung cancer, scientists say. While tobacco use
has plummeted since the 1960s, obesity rates have soared.
Overall, rates of new cancer diagnosis have been declining
slightly since the mid-1990s. They fell 0.6% annually among men between 1998
and 2008. But the declines aren't uniform. Among women, rates fell 0.5%
annually between 1998 and 2006 and then leveled off between 2006 and 2008.
A review of more than 7,000 studies found evidence of a link
between excess weight and several cancers, according to the report. While the
precise link isn't understood, fat cells can encourage the body to produce more
substances such as insulin or hormones that can stimulate tumor growth,
scientists say. Obese postmenopausal women may have higher levels of free
estrogens and androgens, a risk factor for breast, ovarian and uterine cancers.
Adenocarcinoma, in the lower esophagus, develops mostly in people who suffer
from chronic stomach-acid reflux, often triggered by excess weight.
Not all of the obesity-related cancers are on the rise. Rates of
colorectal cancer declined 2.6% yearly between 1999 and 2008, thanks in large
part to widespread screening. Whether
the rise in obesity-related cancers will continue is unknown.
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