Puma pharmaceutical's new drug, neratinib, did not perform as well as Herceptin in the latest clinical trials - by the definition of extending disease free survival.
However, bad news doesn't mean bad news when you look at the rest of the story.
"As expected, there was no statistically significant difference in progression-free survival and objective response rate for the paclitaxel plus neratinib arm compared to the paclitaxel plus trastuzumab arm," Auerbach said. "However ... while the development of other HER2-targeted drugs has produced a clinically meaningful benefit to patients with HER2 positive breast cancer, these drugs have had little impact on CNS metastases. As a result, we believe that there remains an unmet clinical need for reducing the incidence of CNS metastases, and the results of the NEfERTT study demonstrate that we may be able to provide this type of improvement with neratinib."
CNS metastases are Clinical Nervous System mets (I had to look that up). Which would really suck. So that means that while it did not extend disease free survival it did open a door to other advancements. So stay tuned, I guess, for the rest of the story. Or maybe this is just called progress.
Showing posts with label progress. Show all posts
Showing posts with label progress. Show all posts
Sunday, November 15, 2015
Friday, August 28, 2015
I'm not that standardized
Here's a new proposal. Give surgeon's a black box to help prevent medical errors, like they have in air planes.
The proposal:
"Inside the operating room, video cameras track every movement. Outside, a small computer-like device analyzes the recordings, identifying when mistakes are made and providing instant feedback to surgeons as they operate.
This is the dream of the surgical "black box." Operations could become flawless. Post-operative complications could be significantly reduced. Surgeons could review the footage to improve their technique and prep for the next big case."
The goal is so a surgeon learns of a mistake when it can be corrected and not after the fact. They get a computer assist. And more significantly they could be adopted in the US without FDA approval as they are not a device or anything.
I'm not saying that I am against improving medical errors or anything. I have myself dealt with a few mishaps in the OR but I do not think the human body is standard enough for this. Each human is unique. That's it. We are all one of a kind.
If someone wants to operate on me, I have many issues - from lack of thyroid, previous surgeries which have left scars, and more. I know they can be programmed into a computer before hand but still. An individual human being is needed who can interpret the information and unique qualities of the body they have opened up in front of them.
I think of it this way. You are going to a strange place and you program the address into your GPS and start on your merry way. But then the GPS sends you to a road which has a detour and it recalculates around it, so you keep going. It even tells you when you are speeding to give you additional information and recalculates your arrival time. Then it forgets to tell you that the off ramp is on the left and not the right. And then there is an accident ahead so you try to get off the highway and make another detour. And then your GPS sends you down a one way street in the wrong direction.
You needed a human there to guide you to read the signs and notice the detour ahead. Or to tell you about a new problem the patient is having.
A friend had a bad colonscopy and had to have a colectomy. The surgery took much longer than expected because the doctor who removed the polyp at the colonscopy did not note correctly where it was that it happened so the surgeon had to spend quite a bit of time looking for the exact spot. What would that little black box do then? React like the robot in "Lost in Space"? 'Danger, Will Robinson, danger!' That wouldn't exactly prevent much of anything.
There is research going on with these currently in Canada with plans to test them in Canada, Denmark and South America.
But I am really not ready for them to be used on me anytime soon. I would rather have a better trained surgeon than a computer assisted surgeon operating on me.
The proposal:
"Inside the operating room, video cameras track every movement. Outside, a small computer-like device analyzes the recordings, identifying when mistakes are made and providing instant feedback to surgeons as they operate.
This is the dream of the surgical "black box." Operations could become flawless. Post-operative complications could be significantly reduced. Surgeons could review the footage to improve their technique and prep for the next big case."
The goal is so a surgeon learns of a mistake when it can be corrected and not after the fact. They get a computer assist. And more significantly they could be adopted in the US without FDA approval as they are not a device or anything.
I'm not saying that I am against improving medical errors or anything. I have myself dealt with a few mishaps in the OR but I do not think the human body is standard enough for this. Each human is unique. That's it. We are all one of a kind.
If someone wants to operate on me, I have many issues - from lack of thyroid, previous surgeries which have left scars, and more. I know they can be programmed into a computer before hand but still. An individual human being is needed who can interpret the information and unique qualities of the body they have opened up in front of them.
I think of it this way. You are going to a strange place and you program the address into your GPS and start on your merry way. But then the GPS sends you to a road which has a detour and it recalculates around it, so you keep going. It even tells you when you are speeding to give you additional information and recalculates your arrival time. Then it forgets to tell you that the off ramp is on the left and not the right. And then there is an accident ahead so you try to get off the highway and make another detour. And then your GPS sends you down a one way street in the wrong direction.
You needed a human there to guide you to read the signs and notice the detour ahead. Or to tell you about a new problem the patient is having.
A friend had a bad colonscopy and had to have a colectomy. The surgery took much longer than expected because the doctor who removed the polyp at the colonscopy did not note correctly where it was that it happened so the surgeon had to spend quite a bit of time looking for the exact spot. What would that little black box do then? React like the robot in "Lost in Space"? 'Danger, Will Robinson, danger!' That wouldn't exactly prevent much of anything.
There is research going on with these currently in Canada with plans to test them in Canada, Denmark and South America.
But I am really not ready for them to be used on me anytime soon. I would rather have a better trained surgeon than a computer assisted surgeon operating on me.
Tuesday, August 11, 2015
A new understanding of cancer
I read both these articles recently and sort of jumbled them around in my brain and thought about them. They make a lot of sense. There is current medical research which is focusing on a new cancer classification system based on their genetic make up and not on which part of the body they are found.
Think about it. We may call it a head cold or the stomach flu, right? But we know they are different and treat them differently. With cancer, its the same thing. Breast cancer and stomach cancer get different treatments - but they are chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation - which are fairly similar. And then doctors wonder why some patient's cancers do not respond to treatment the way other patient's cancers do.
But their genetic make up may very well be the key here.
"In the triple-negative breast tumors, named as such because they lack the three hormone receptors targeted by the most successful therapies, the researchers learned the molecular wiring looked so different from any other breast cancers that they think the disease may warrant a new classification."
There is lots more you can read about this here.
Then Providence Health & Services, which provides care to those in need in the northwestern US, has released a plan to sequence the DNA of cancers - another state of the art leap in cancer diagnosis and treatment.
I call this all progress, in a good way.
Think about it. We may call it a head cold or the stomach flu, right? But we know they are different and treat them differently. With cancer, its the same thing. Breast cancer and stomach cancer get different treatments - but they are chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation - which are fairly similar. And then doctors wonder why some patient's cancers do not respond to treatment the way other patient's cancers do.
But their genetic make up may very well be the key here.
"In the triple-negative breast tumors, named as such because they lack the three hormone receptors targeted by the most successful therapies, the researchers learned the molecular wiring looked so different from any other breast cancers that they think the disease may warrant a new classification."
There is lots more you can read about this here.
Then Providence Health & Services, which provides care to those in need in the northwestern US, has released a plan to sequence the DNA of cancers - another state of the art leap in cancer diagnosis and treatment.
I call this all progress, in a good way.
Saturday, May 9, 2015
Using immune cells to reduce tumors
This sound interesting. Not stem cells, but the patient's own immune cells, were used to help to help fight cancer.
What they did is:
"Researchers at the National Cancer Institute sequenced the genome of her cancer and identified cells from her immune system that attacked a specific mutation in the malignant cells. Then they grew those immune cells in the laboratory and infused billions of them back into her bloodstream.
The tumors began “melting away,” said Dr. Steven A. Rosenberg, senior author of the article and chief of the surgery branch at the cancer institute."
Now the patient is not cured but her tumors are much smaller. She had an advanced and particularly deadly type of cancer in 2012 when she was approached to try this experiemental technique. Now just because it worked on one person, it does not mean its ready for prime time. But it does represent a new approach to cancer treatment.
What they did is:
"Researchers at the National Cancer Institute sequenced the genome of her cancer and identified cells from her immune system that attacked a specific mutation in the malignant cells. Then they grew those immune cells in the laboratory and infused billions of them back into her bloodstream.
The tumors began “melting away,” said Dr. Steven A. Rosenberg, senior author of the article and chief of the surgery branch at the cancer institute."
Now the patient is not cured but her tumors are much smaller. She had an advanced and particularly deadly type of cancer in 2012 when she was approached to try this experiemental technique. Now just because it worked on one person, it does not mean its ready for prime time. But it does represent a new approach to cancer treatment.
Thursday, April 30, 2015
A trip down memory lane
Back in 1971-2, half of all cancer patients lived one year. Now, in the UK at least, half of all cancer 'sufferers' (how is that for a horrible term?) live for ten years. I would assume the rates are similar, or even better in the US. But even in digging around in the National Cancer Institute's website, I could find the data.
The actual quote is:
"The analysis showed that in 1971-2, 50% of people diagnosed with cancer died within a year. Now 50% survive for at least a decade - up from 24% in 1971-2.
But the findings, based on the outcomes for more than 7 million patients, also showed that for some cancers, survival rates were still very low.
For example, just 1% of pancreatic cancer patients and 5% of lung cancer patients can expect to survive for 10 years."
So there is good news and bad news mixed together. But it does show a huge improvement in cancer treatment and research.
The goal is to have it increase to 75% survival rate for ten years. Its not just treatment and research but also screening and earlier diagnosis which have come in to play.
So progress is good. It shows we how far we have come. But we also need to work on the vocabulary. Sufferers? Really?
The actual quote is:
"The analysis showed that in 1971-2, 50% of people diagnosed with cancer died within a year. Now 50% survive for at least a decade - up from 24% in 1971-2.
But the findings, based on the outcomes for more than 7 million patients, also showed that for some cancers, survival rates were still very low.
For example, just 1% of pancreatic cancer patients and 5% of lung cancer patients can expect to survive for 10 years."
So there is good news and bad news mixed together. But it does show a huge improvement in cancer treatment and research.
The goal is to have it increase to 75% survival rate for ten years. Its not just treatment and research but also screening and earlier diagnosis which have come in to play.
So progress is good. It shows we how far we have come. But we also need to work on the vocabulary. Sufferers? Really?
Friday, April 17, 2015
Blood test for breast cancer
I find this exciting news. A new blood test has been developed which can show if breast cancer has spread and if it is responding to treatment.
It seems silly in this day and age that we can only find out if breast cancer, and many other cancers, have spread by waiting for symptoms and looking for signs in imaging tests. We have to wait for it to show up and cause problems. Doesn't that sound archaic? Get some leeches too...
Medical advances have come a long way in recent years. An operating room resembles a space ship cockpit in some ways. There are robotics and little head sets and all sorts of things. But we still have to wait for symptoms of cancer....
It seems silly in this day and age that we can only find out if breast cancer, and many other cancers, have spread by waiting for symptoms and looking for signs in imaging tests. We have to wait for it to show up and cause problems. Doesn't that sound archaic? Get some leeches too...
Medical advances have come a long way in recent years. An operating room resembles a space ship cockpit in some ways. There are robotics and little head sets and all sorts of things. But we still have to wait for symptoms of cancer....
Friday, January 30, 2015
A trip down memory lane
Back in 1971-2, half of all cancer patients lived one year. Now, in the UK at least, half of all cancer 'sufferers' (how is that for a horrible term?) live for ten years. I would assume the rates are similar, or even better in the US. But even in digging around in the National Cancer Institute's website, I could find the data.
The actual quote is:
"The analysis showed that in 1971-2, 50% of people diagnosed with cancer died within a year. Now 50% survive for at least a decade - up from 24% in 1971-2.
But the findings, based on the outcomes for more than 7 million patients, also showed that for some cancers, survival rates were still very low.
For example, just 1% of pancreatic cancer patients and 5% of lung cancer patients can expect to survive for 10 years."
So there is good news and bad news mixed together. But it does show a huge improvement in cancer treatment and research.
The goal is to have it increase to 75% survival rate for ten years. Its not just treatment and research but also screening and earlier diagnosis which have come in to play.
So progress is good. It shows we how far we have come. But we also need to work on the vocabulary. Sufferers? Really?
The actual quote is:
"The analysis showed that in 1971-2, 50% of people diagnosed with cancer died within a year. Now 50% survive for at least a decade - up from 24% in 1971-2.
But the findings, based on the outcomes for more than 7 million patients, also showed that for some cancers, survival rates were still very low.
For example, just 1% of pancreatic cancer patients and 5% of lung cancer patients can expect to survive for 10 years."
So there is good news and bad news mixed together. But it does show a huge improvement in cancer treatment and research.
The goal is to have it increase to 75% survival rate for ten years. Its not just treatment and research but also screening and earlier diagnosis which have come in to play.
So progress is good. It shows we how far we have come. But we also need to work on the vocabulary. Sufferers? Really?
Tuesday, January 27, 2015
Progress with a certain degree of ickiness
Would you walk around with wires sticking out of the top of your head which is covered in bandages? I am not as concerned about how I look but the idea of wires sticking out of my head. And you have to change the transducers every three or four days. Hence the ick factor.
Glioblastomas are nasty brain tumors, the type that killed Senator Ted Kennedy. They are not easily treatable. These new devices use electromagnetic fields to control the tumor cells.
"The sophisticated system involves covering a shaved scalp with insulated electrical transducers, which transform electricity into electromagnetic energy. The transducer devices are affixed to the skin with wide overlapping bandages, giving the appearance of a high-tech shower cap.
Electromagnetic fields — generated from electricity produced via a 6-pound battery pack that patients carry on their backs — pass through the skull and brain tissue, and target rapidly reproducing tumor cells, disrupting their delicate process of cell division.
The electromagnetic fields don’t damage the brain’s healthy neurons and anatomical structures because those structures are not undergoing cell division. The fields exert force on proteins — which become electrically charged when the tumor cell is in the process of dividing — and that halts the cell division and destroys the cancer cells."
So you have to carry around a six pound battery pack. That alone would slow me down with my bad back. The other problem is it costs, brace yourself, $21,000 each month. And currently Medicare and many insurers won't pay for it.
However the manufacturer expects, but is not guaranteed, FDA approval in the next year or so. But there is no guarantee of any insurance coverage in the future. To me there is the ick factor and the idea of big brother watching what you are thinking through your brain cells...
Glioblastomas are nasty brain tumors, the type that killed Senator Ted Kennedy. They are not easily treatable. These new devices use electromagnetic fields to control the tumor cells.
"The sophisticated system involves covering a shaved scalp with insulated electrical transducers, which transform electricity into electromagnetic energy. The transducer devices are affixed to the skin with wide overlapping bandages, giving the appearance of a high-tech shower cap.
Electromagnetic fields — generated from electricity produced via a 6-pound battery pack that patients carry on their backs — pass through the skull and brain tissue, and target rapidly reproducing tumor cells, disrupting their delicate process of cell division.
The electromagnetic fields don’t damage the brain’s healthy neurons and anatomical structures because those structures are not undergoing cell division. The fields exert force on proteins — which become electrically charged when the tumor cell is in the process of dividing — and that halts the cell division and destroys the cancer cells."
So you have to carry around a six pound battery pack. That alone would slow me down with my bad back. The other problem is it costs, brace yourself, $21,000 each month. And currently Medicare and many insurers won't pay for it.
However the manufacturer expects, but is not guaranteed, FDA approval in the next year or so. But there is no guarantee of any insurance coverage in the future. To me there is the ick factor and the idea of big brother watching what you are thinking through your brain cells...
Monday, January 19, 2015
I'm not that standardized
Here's a new proposal. Give surgeon's a black box to help prevent medical errors, like they have in air planes.
The proposal:
"Inside the operating room, video cameras track every movement. Outside, a small computer-like device analyzes the recordings, identifying when mistakes are made and providing instant feedback to surgeons as they operate.
This is the dream of the surgical "black box." Operations could become flawless. Post-operative complications could be significantly reduced. Surgeons could review the footage to improve their technique and prep for the next big case."
The goal is so a surgeon learns of a mistake when it can be corrected and not after the fact. They get a computer assist. And more significantly they could be adopted in the US without FDA approval as they are not a device or anything.
I'm not saying that I am against improving medical errors or anything. I have myself dealt with a few mishaps in the OR but I do not think the human body is standard enough for this. Each human is unique. That's it. We are all one of a kind.
If someone wants to operate on me, I have many issues - from lack of thyroid, previous surgeries which have left scars, and more. I know they can be programmed into a computer before hand but still. An individual human being is needed who can interpret the information and unique qualities of the body they have opened up in front of them.
I think of it this way. You are going to a strange place and you program the address into your GPS and start on your merry way. But then the GPS sends you to a road which has a detour and it recalculates around it, so you keep going. It even tells you when you are speeding to give you additional information and recalculates your arrival time. Then it forgets to tell you that the off ramp is on the left and not the right. And then there is an accident ahead so you try to get off the highway and make another detour. And then your GPS sends you down a one way street in the wrong direction.
You needed a human there to guide you to read the signs and notice the detour ahead. Or to tell you about a new problem the patient is having.
A friend had a bad colonscopy and had to have a colectomy. The surgery took much longer than expected because the doctor who removed the polyp at the colonscopy did not note correctly where it was that it happened so the surgeon had to spend quite a bit of time looking for the exact spot. What would that little black box do then? React like the robot in "Lost in Space"? 'Danger, Will Robinson, danger!' That wouldn't exactly prevent much of anything.
There is research going on with these currently in Canada with plans to test them in Canada, Denmark and South America.
But I am really not ready for them to be used on me anytime soon. I would rather have a better trained surgeon than a computer assisted surgeon operating on me.
The proposal:
"Inside the operating room, video cameras track every movement. Outside, a small computer-like device analyzes the recordings, identifying when mistakes are made and providing instant feedback to surgeons as they operate.
This is the dream of the surgical "black box." Operations could become flawless. Post-operative complications could be significantly reduced. Surgeons could review the footage to improve their technique and prep for the next big case."
The goal is so a surgeon learns of a mistake when it can be corrected and not after the fact. They get a computer assist. And more significantly they could be adopted in the US without FDA approval as they are not a device or anything.
I'm not saying that I am against improving medical errors or anything. I have myself dealt with a few mishaps in the OR but I do not think the human body is standard enough for this. Each human is unique. That's it. We are all one of a kind.
If someone wants to operate on me, I have many issues - from lack of thyroid, previous surgeries which have left scars, and more. I know they can be programmed into a computer before hand but still. An individual human being is needed who can interpret the information and unique qualities of the body they have opened up in front of them.
I think of it this way. You are going to a strange place and you program the address into your GPS and start on your merry way. But then the GPS sends you to a road which has a detour and it recalculates around it, so you keep going. It even tells you when you are speeding to give you additional information and recalculates your arrival time. Then it forgets to tell you that the off ramp is on the left and not the right. And then there is an accident ahead so you try to get off the highway and make another detour. And then your GPS sends you down a one way street in the wrong direction.
You needed a human there to guide you to read the signs and notice the detour ahead. Or to tell you about a new problem the patient is having.
A friend had a bad colonscopy and had to have a colectomy. The surgery took much longer than expected because the doctor who removed the polyp at the colonscopy did not note correctly where it was that it happened so the surgeon had to spend quite a bit of time looking for the exact spot. What would that little black box do then? React like the robot in "Lost in Space"? 'Danger, Will Robinson, danger!' That wouldn't exactly prevent much of anything.
There is research going on with these currently in Canada with plans to test them in Canada, Denmark and South America.
But I am really not ready for them to be used on me anytime soon. I would rather have a better trained surgeon than a computer assisted surgeon operating on me.
Sunday, January 18, 2015
Progress with a certain degree of ickiness
Would you walk around with wires sticking out of the top of your head which is covered in bandages? I am not as concerned about how I look but the idea of wires sticking out of my head. And you have to change the transducers every three or four days. Hence the ick factor.
Glioblastomas are nasty brain tumors, the type that killed Senator Ted Kennedy. They are not easily treatable. These new devices use electromagnetic fields to control the tumor cells.
"The sophisticated system involves covering a shaved scalp with insulated electrical transducers, which transform electricity into electromagnetic energy. The transducer devices are affixed to the skin with wide overlapping bandages, giving the appearance of a high-tech shower cap.
Electromagnetic fields — generated from electricity produced via a 6-pound battery pack that patients carry on their backs — pass through the skull and brain tissue, and target rapidly reproducing tumor cells, disrupting their delicate process of cell division.
The electromagnetic fields don’t damage the brain’s healthy neurons and anatomical structures because those structures are not undergoing cell division. The fields exert force on proteins — which become electrically charged when the tumor cell is in the process of dividing — and that halts the cell division and destroys the cancer cells."
So you have to carry around a six pound battery pack. That alone would slow me down with my bad back. The other problem is it costs, brace yourself, $21,000 each month. And currently Medicare and many insurers won't pay for it.
However the manufacturer expects, but is not guaranteed, FDA approval in the next year or so. But there is no guarantee of any insurance coverage in the future. To me there is the ick factor and the idea of big brother watching what you are thinking through your brain cells...
Glioblastomas are nasty brain tumors, the type that killed Senator Ted Kennedy. They are not easily treatable. These new devices use electromagnetic fields to control the tumor cells.
"The sophisticated system involves covering a shaved scalp with insulated electrical transducers, which transform electricity into electromagnetic energy. The transducer devices are affixed to the skin with wide overlapping bandages, giving the appearance of a high-tech shower cap.
Electromagnetic fields — generated from electricity produced via a 6-pound battery pack that patients carry on their backs — pass through the skull and brain tissue, and target rapidly reproducing tumor cells, disrupting their delicate process of cell division.
The electromagnetic fields don’t damage the brain’s healthy neurons and anatomical structures because those structures are not undergoing cell division. The fields exert force on proteins — which become electrically charged when the tumor cell is in the process of dividing — and that halts the cell division and destroys the cancer cells."
So you have to carry around a six pound battery pack. That alone would slow me down with my bad back. The other problem is it costs, brace yourself, $21,000 each month. And currently Medicare and many insurers won't pay for it.
However the manufacturer expects, but is not guaranteed, FDA approval in the next year or so. But there is no guarantee of any insurance coverage in the future. To me there is the ick factor and the idea of big brother watching what you are thinking through your brain cells...
Saturday, January 17, 2015
Blood test for breast cancer
I find this exciting news. A new blood test has been developed which can show if breast cancer has spread and if it is responding to treatment.
It seems silly in this day and age that we can only find out if breast cancer, and many other cancers, have spread by waiting for symptoms and looking for signs in imaging tests. We have to wait for it to show up and cause problems. Doesn't that sound archaic? Get some leeches too...
Medical advances have come a long way in recent years. An operating room resembles a space ship cockpit in some ways. There are robotics and little head sets and all sorts of things. But we still have to wait for symptoms of cancer....
It seems silly in this day and age that we can only find out if breast cancer, and many other cancers, have spread by waiting for symptoms and looking for signs in imaging tests. We have to wait for it to show up and cause problems. Doesn't that sound archaic? Get some leeches too...
Medical advances have come a long way in recent years. An operating room resembles a space ship cockpit in some ways. There are robotics and little head sets and all sorts of things. But we still have to wait for symptoms of cancer....
Thursday, January 15, 2015
Gimme the paint!
This may look like a slightly disgusting picture but its a picture of a tumor as it would be inside one's body with and without the new tumor paint.
The left shows a tumor image on an MRI. The right shows the bad stuff lit up with the toxin from the Israeli Deathstalker scorpion (I'm not making this up) and shows the bad stuff - the stuff the surgeon wants to cut out. The other colors represent the good stuff.
This works on brain, breast and other tumors. I find this incredibly cool. Now surgeons go in and look at MRI and other imaging and figure out which are the good cells and which contain the cancer cooties. They would guess and use their experience. But if they took a few too many brain cells, the patient may never be the same. This is also why surgeons have problems getting clean margins because they are doing some guess work.
I love this quote:
'"In a matter of 10 years, surgeons will look back and say, 'I can't believe we used to remove (tumors) by using our eyes and our fingers and our thumbs,' " Olson says.'
Read all about it here. I find this very exciting! I want that paint before any more cancer surgeries.
This works on brain, breast and other tumors. I find this incredibly cool. Now surgeons go in and look at MRI and other imaging and figure out which are the good cells and which contain the cancer cooties. They would guess and use their experience. But if they took a few too many brain cells, the patient may never be the same. This is also why surgeons have problems getting clean margins because they are doing some guess work.
I love this quote:
'"In a matter of 10 years, surgeons will look back and say, 'I can't believe we used to remove (tumors) by using our eyes and our fingers and our thumbs,' " Olson says.'
Read all about it here. I find this very exciting! I want that paint before any more cancer surgeries.
Dear Medical Researchers
Dear Medical Researchers:
This is what I want from you, besides a cure for cancer.
Thank you.
A patient.
This is what I want from you, besides a cure for cancer.
- A medication with these side effects: weight loss, the ability to get 8 hours of consecutive sleep, and anti-depressant.
- A cure for the common cold. This should be easy after a cure for cancer.
- Medical tests that do not come with a 'pinch', a burning sensation, or being stuck with needles or any other 'ouchie'.
- A dictionary that instantly translates 'doctor-speak', either the mumbo jumbo of big words or the vagueness of a non-answer, into normal human English.
- Thrift - I want inexpensive treatments that will not line the pockets of pharmaceutical companies or others so that the term 'medical bankruptcy' will become obsolete.
Thank you.
A patient.
Bad news doesn't always mean bad news
Puma pharmaceutical's new drug, neratinib, did not perform as well as Herceptin in the latest clinical trials - by the definition of extending disease free survival.
However, bad news doesn't mean bad news when you look at the rest of the story.
"As expected, there was no statistically significant difference in progression-free survival and objective response rate for the paclitaxel plus neratinib arm compared to the paclitaxel plus trastuzumab arm," Auerbach said. "However ... while the development of other HER2-targeted drugs has produced a clinically meaningful benefit to patients with HER2 positive breast cancer, these drugs have had little impact on CNS metastases. As a result, we believe that there remains an unmet clinical need for reducing the incidence of CNS metastases, and the results of the NEfERTT study demonstrate that we may be able to provide this type of improvement with neratinib."
CNS metastases are Clinical Nervous System mets (I had to look that up). Which would really suck. So that means that while it did not extend disease free survival it did open a door to other advancements. So stay tuned, I guess, for the rest of the story. Or maybe this is just called progress.
However, bad news doesn't mean bad news when you look at the rest of the story.
"As expected, there was no statistically significant difference in progression-free survival and objective response rate for the paclitaxel plus neratinib arm compared to the paclitaxel plus trastuzumab arm," Auerbach said. "However ... while the development of other HER2-targeted drugs has produced a clinically meaningful benefit to patients with HER2 positive breast cancer, these drugs have had little impact on CNS metastases. As a result, we believe that there remains an unmet clinical need for reducing the incidence of CNS metastases, and the results of the NEfERTT study demonstrate that we may be able to provide this type of improvement with neratinib."
CNS metastases are Clinical Nervous System mets (I had to look that up). Which would really suck. So that means that while it did not extend disease free survival it did open a door to other advancements. So stay tuned, I guess, for the rest of the story. Or maybe this is just called progress.
Sunday, January 11, 2015
A new understanding of cancer
I read both these articles recently and sort of jumbled them around in my brain and thought about them. They make a lot of sense. There is current medical research which is focusing on a new cancer classification system based on their genetic make up and not on which part of the body they are found.
Think about it. We may call it a head cold or the stomach flu, right? But we know they are different and treat them differently. With cancer, its the same thing. Breast cancer and stomach cancer get different treatments - but they are chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation - which are fairly similar. And then doctors wonder why some patient's cancers do not respond to treatment the way other patient's cancers do.
But their genetic make up may very well be the key here.
"In the triple-negative breast tumors, named as such because they lack the three hormone receptors targeted by the most successful therapies, the researchers learned the molecular wiring looked so different from any other breast cancers that they think the disease may warrant a new classification."
There is lots more you can read about this here.
Then Providence Health & Services, which provides care to those in need in the northwestern US, has released a plan to sequence the DNA of cancers - another state of the art leap in cancer diagnosis and treatment.
I call this all progress, in a good way.
Think about it. We may call it a head cold or the stomach flu, right? But we know they are different and treat them differently. With cancer, its the same thing. Breast cancer and stomach cancer get different treatments - but they are chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation - which are fairly similar. And then doctors wonder why some patient's cancers do not respond to treatment the way other patient's cancers do.
But their genetic make up may very well be the key here.
"In the triple-negative breast tumors, named as such because they lack the three hormone receptors targeted by the most successful therapies, the researchers learned the molecular wiring looked so different from any other breast cancers that they think the disease may warrant a new classification."
There is lots more you can read about this here.
Then Providence Health & Services, which provides care to those in need in the northwestern US, has released a plan to sequence the DNA of cancers - another state of the art leap in cancer diagnosis and treatment.
I call this all progress, in a good way.
Friday, January 9, 2015
Using immune cells to reduce tumors
This sound interesting. Not stem cells, but the patient's own immune cells, were used to help to help fight cancer.
What they did is:
"Researchers at the National Cancer Institute sequenced the genome of her cancer and identified cells from her immune system that attacked a specific mutation in the malignant cells. Then they grew those immune cells in the laboratory and infused billions of them back into her bloodstream.
The tumors began “melting away,” said Dr. Steven A. Rosenberg, senior author of the article and chief of the surgery branch at the cancer institute."
Now the patient is not cured but her tumors are much smaller. She had an advanced and particularly deadly type of cancer in 2012 when she was approached to try this experiemental technique. Now just because it worked on one person, it does not mean its ready for prime time. But it does represent a new approach to cancer treatment.
What they did is:
"Researchers at the National Cancer Institute sequenced the genome of her cancer and identified cells from her immune system that attacked a specific mutation in the malignant cells. Then they grew those immune cells in the laboratory and infused billions of them back into her bloodstream.
The tumors began “melting away,” said Dr. Steven A. Rosenberg, senior author of the article and chief of the surgery branch at the cancer institute."
Now the patient is not cured but her tumors are much smaller. She had an advanced and particularly deadly type of cancer in 2012 when she was approached to try this experiemental technique. Now just because it worked on one person, it does not mean its ready for prime time. But it does represent a new approach to cancer treatment.
Friday, January 2, 2015
Cancer Immunotherapy
That's a mouthful. But Science Magazine has named Cancer Immunotherapy as their breakthrough for the year. So what exactly is that?
"“Immunotherapy marks an entirely different way of treating cancer — by targeting the immune system, not the tumor itself,” Science said... Based on the idea that the immune system can be trained to attack tumors in the same way that it targets infectious agents, cancer immunotherapy exploits the ability to harness different types of immune cells circulating in the body."
Researchers have already made some progress with this way of thinking with both melanoma and leukemia. They have plans in the works for progress for lymphoma and prostate cancer with trials set to begin soon.
From the patient's point of view, I think a new way of looking at cancer and treating it is real progress, instead of more of the same.
"“Immunotherapy marks an entirely different way of treating cancer — by targeting the immune system, not the tumor itself,” Science said... Based on the idea that the immune system can be trained to attack tumors in the same way that it targets infectious agents, cancer immunotherapy exploits the ability to harness different types of immune cells circulating in the body."
Researchers have already made some progress with this way of thinking with both melanoma and leukemia. They have plans in the works for progress for lymphoma and prostate cancer with trials set to begin soon.
From the patient's point of view, I think a new way of looking at cancer and treating it is real progress, instead of more of the same.
The elusive breast cancer vaccine
A few years back I blogged about curing mice in pursuit of a breast cancer vaccine. Then three years ago, I blogged about progress in this vaccine plan. More than four years from my first post, here I can post about the first clinical trials on a breast cancer vaccine.
But before the celebratory parade starts, a few notes of caution. This vaccine will not work on all patients. It will only be effective on patients who's tumor produces mammaglobin-A.
And while progress has been made since the first mice curing trials, this trial was a small phase 1 clinical trial involving 14 metastatic women. These women did experience some benefit from it and the hope is that healthier women who's immune system is not as compromised after years of chemotherapy and hormonal treatment will show more benefit.
So we can call this progress but after waiting since June of 2010, we still need more research and more waiting.
But before the celebratory parade starts, a few notes of caution. This vaccine will not work on all patients. It will only be effective on patients who's tumor produces mammaglobin-A.
And while progress has been made since the first mice curing trials, this trial was a small phase 1 clinical trial involving 14 metastatic women. These women did experience some benefit from it and the hope is that healthier women who's immune system is not as compromised after years of chemotherapy and hormonal treatment will show more benefit.
So we can call this progress but after waiting since June of 2010, we still need more research and more waiting.
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