Today, as many as 23 million children and teens are obese or overweight, and it is estimated that more than one-third of U.S. adults (more than 72 million people) are obese, according to a statement released by ASCO to help raise awareness of National Childhood Obesity Awareness Month....
In a study reported in Journal of Clinical Oncology, Gregory T. Armstrong, MD, of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis, and colleagues assessed the frequency of major cardiac events and cardiovascular risk factors among adult survivors of childhood cancer and their siblings. They...
For the first time, a genetic link specific to risk of childhood leukemia has been identified, according to a team of researchers from Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, University of Washington, and other institutions. The discovery was reported...
A large-scale survey of women undergoing mammography screening on Long Island, New York, indicates that the majority (90.6%) either underestimate or overestimate their lifetime risk for developing breast cancer. Furthermore, 4 in 10 women surveyed reported they had never discussed their...
St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital investigators have identified a protein that certain high-risk acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) cells need to survive and have used that knowledge to fashion a more effective method of killing tumor cells. The findings appear in the August 29 edition of ...
Survivors of childhood cancer are at risk for long-term adverse physical and mental effects, but little is known about the effects of illness in siblings of these patients. In a study reported in Lancet Oncology, Lasse Wegener Lund, MD, of the Danish Cancer Society Research Centre in...
A retrospective analysis of 110 patients with juvenile myelomonocytic leukemia found that single-unit, unrelated donor umbilical cord blood transplantation resulted in a 5-year disease-free survival rate of 44%. “Our data document that a significant proportion of children with this disease,...
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) today released its final recommendation statement on primary care interventions to prevent tobacco use in children and adolescents. The Task Force recommends that primary care clinicians provide interventions, including education or brief...
In a study (Medical Research Council AML 15 Trial) reported in Journal of Clinical Oncology, Alan K. Burnett, MD, of Cardiff University School of Medicine and colleagues compared induction with daunorubicin/cytarabine, daunorubicin/cytarabine plus etoposide, and fludarabine/cytarabine/granulocyte...
In a study reported in Journal of Clinical Oncology, Anthony V. Moorman, PhD, of Newcastle University, and colleagues compared outcomes in children and adolescents with B-cell precursor acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) and intrachromosomal amplification of chromosome 21 (iAMP21) in a trial in...
Intrachromosomal amplification of a region of chromosome 21 (iAMP21; three or more extra copies of RUNX1 on an abnormal chromosome 21) is a recently identified recurrent genomic abnormality associated with poorer outcome in acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). In a study reported in Journal of...
A new analysis has found that breastfeeding for more than 6 months may safeguard nonsmoking mothers against breast cancer. However, the same does not seem to hold true for mothers who smoke. Published early online in the Journal of Clinical Nursing, the findings add to the list of benefits of...
Parents and siblings of children with cancer have between a two- and four-times increased risk of developing cancer than first-degree relatives with no childhood cancer patients, according to a study published in the International Journal of Cancer. The study, led by Joshua Schiffman, MD, Medical...
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) today approved dolutegravir (Tivicay), a new drug to treat HIV-1 infection. Dolutegravir is an oral integrase strand transfer inhibitor that interferes with one of the enzymes necessary for HIV to multiply. The drug is taken in combination with other...
A multistate study led by researchers at the University of Utah has revealed that the risk for childhood cancer is moderately increased among children and young adolescents with certain types of major birth defects. Children born with nonchromosomal birth defects have a two-fold higher risk of...
Researchers at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James) have discovered a novel mechanism responsible for the loss of a critical tumor-suppressor gene in rhabdomyosarcoma and other...
Scientists at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital have discovered a way to target the immune system to shrink or eliminate tumors in mice without causing autoimmune problems. Researchers also found evidence that the same mechanism may operate in humans. The study was published online today...
The contribution of purging of peripheral blood stem cells to outcome of autologous stem cell transplantation in high-risk neuroblastoma has not been defined. In a trial (COG A3973) reported in Lancet Oncology by Susan G. Kreissman, MD, of Duke University Medical Center, and colleagues, children...
A number of different strategies for combining chemotherapy and radiation therapy have been evaluated in the effort to improve survival in patients with high-risk medulloblastoma. In a trial (POG 9031) reported in Journal of Clinical Oncology, Nancy J. Tarbell, MD, of Massachusetts General Hospital ...
In an analysis of 5-year survival rates among black and white women diagnosed with breast cancer between 1991 and 2005, black women continued to have a lower rate of survival, with most of the difference related to factors including poorer health of black patients at diagnosis and more advanced...
Boys are more likely to receive the quadrivalent human papillomavirus vaccine if their mothers receive flu shots or Pap screenings, according to a study from Kaiser Permanente published in the American Journal of Public Health. Study Details The study examined the electronic health records of...
Scientists at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital have discovered that a protein used by cancer cells to evade death also plays a vital role in heart health. This dual role complicates efforts to develop cancer drugs that target the protein, but may lead to new therapies for heart muscle...
Scientists have successfully targeted a malfunctioning immune system enzyme to kill diseased cells from patients with myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS), a precursor to acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Reporting their results in Cancer Cell, researchers say their successful laboratory tests in human MDS...
A study examining trends in x-ray computed tomography (CT) use in children in the United States has found that reducing unnecessary scans and lowering the doses for the highest-dose scans could lower the overall lifetime risk of future imaging-related cancers by 62%. The research was published...
Treating pediatric leukemia patients with a liposomal formulation of anthracycline-based chemotherapy at an intensified dose during initial treatment may result in high survival rates without causing any added heart toxicity, according to the results of a study published online in Blood, the...
Beta-blockers, normally used for high blood pressure, could enhance the effectiveness of chemotherapies in treating neuroblastoma, according to a new study published today in the British Journal of Cancer. Early Results Promising Researchers from the Children’s Cancer Institute Australia...
The pages of medical history are dog-eared with breakthroughs that have transformed medicine and saved lives. One of those dog-eared pages belongs to Emil Frei III, MD, known to his colleagues and friends as Tom. In the dawn of oncology, Dr. Frei, along with his associate, Emil Freireich, MD, did...
When retinoblastoma is diagnosed in racial and ethnic minority children whose families don't have private health insurance, it often takes a more invasive, potentially life-threatening course than in other children, probably because of delays in diagnosis, researchers at Dana-Farber/Children's...
Nearly two-thirds of children receiving stem cell transplants returned to the hospital within 6 months for treatment of unexplained fevers, infections, or other problems, according to a study performed at Dana-Farber/Children’s Hospital Cancer Center in Boston. Children who received donor...
More than a quarter of a century after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, many children and teenagers who developed thyroid cancer due to radiation are in complete or near remission, according to a recent study accepted for publication in The Endocrine Society’s Journal of Clinical Endocrinology ...
Researchers using patients’ own immune cells in an immunotherapy approach called anti-CD19 chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy achieved responses in children whose acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL) had returned after a bone marrow transplant, according to preliminary results...
Researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center and colleagues at the University of Florida studied health-care providers to determine the factors associated with disparities in human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination among girls, ages 9 to 17, from low-income families. They found that physician vaccination...
A national survey of health professionals showed that drug shortages are taking a heavy toll on cancer patients, forcing treatment changes and delays that for some patients meant worse outcomes, more therapy-related complications, and higher costs. St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital...
Humans have between 20,000 and 25,000 genes that carry instructions for assembling the proteins that do the work of cells. Work led by St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital found that children who inherit certain variations in four particular genes are at much higher risk of developing acute...
The United States Patent and Trademark Office today awarded St. Jude Children's Research Hospital U.S. patent number 8,399,645 for its invention of compositions for genetically modifying human immune cells so they can destroy some of the most common forms of cancer in children and adults. "This...
A team of Canadian and international cancer researchers led by Brenda Gallie, MD,at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, University Health Network (UHN), has discovered a new type of retinoblastoma, a rapidly developing eye cancer that affects very young children—a finding that may...
The National Cancer Policy Forum of the Institute of Medicine (IOM), in conjunction with ASCO, held a workshop in February to discuss a collaborative approach to making the National Cancer Institute (NCI)-funded clinical trials system more viable and productive. This was a follow-up meeting to...
New results from a prospective clinical trial conducted in France show that children with low-risk retinoblastoma do not need adjuvant chemotherapy to prevent disease recurrence or metastasis; the results also suggest that certain patients with intermediate-risk disease can receive less aggressive...
Researchers at Moffitt Cancer Center and colleagues have found that healthy adolescent females have predetermined expectations for becoming parents in the future, but have concerns about fertility and childbearing should they develop a life-threatening illness, such as cancer. The...
A study of older patients with advanced head and neck cancers has found that where they were treated significantly influenced their survival. The study, led by researchers at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and published in the March 1 online edition of Cancer, found that patients who...
After an intensive 3-year hunt through the genome, researchers have pinpointed mutations that lead to drug resistance and relapse in acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) ,the most common type of childhood cancer—the first time anyone has linked the disease’s reemergence to specific...
Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation (ALSF), a registered 501(c)(3) charity, is furthering its commitment to finding cures for all children with cancer by introducing the ALSF Centers of Excellence program. The Centers of Excellence program aims to fund the research of leading childhood cancer...
The FDA approved a new use of imatinib (Gleevec) to treat children newly diagnosed with Philadelphia chromosome–positive acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). ALL is the most common type of pediatric cancer, affecting approximately 2,900 children annually, and progresses quickly if untreated....
Research led by St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital scientists has identified a possible lead in treatment of two childhood leukemia subtypes known for their dramatic loss of chromosomes and poor treatment outcomes. The findings also provide the first evidence of the genetic basis for ...
The Annual Report to the Nation on the Status of Cancer, 1975–2009, shows that overall cancer death rates continued to decline in the United States among both men and women, among all major racial and ethnic groups, and for all of the most common cancer sites, including lung, colon and...