The addition of PCV (procarbazine [Matulane], lomustine [CeeNu], vincristine) chemotherapy to radiotherapy improves progression-free survival in patients with grade 2 glioma, but the potential effect of treatment intensification on cognitive function is a concern in this group of patients with good ...
The drug metformin, which is approved for the treatment of type 2 diabetes, has been tested in clinical trials as a tumor suppressor in different cancers due to its role in activating the AMPK signaling pathway. However, a new study by Liu et al published in Proceedings of the National Academy of...
Interim results from an ongoing phase II clinical trial in patients with various types of advanced neuroendocrine tumors show that a new chemotherapy combination of capecitabine and temozolomide either stalled disease progression or shrank tumors in 95% of patients whose disease worsened after...
Approximately 40% of patients with Hodgkin or non-Hodgkin lymphoma have tumor cells that express the type II latency Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) antigens latent membrane protein 1 (LMP1) and LMP2. T cells specific for these antigens are present in low levels and may be rendered nonreactive by the...
In the phase III START trial reported in The Lancet Oncology, Butts et al assessed whether maintenance treatment with the MUC1 antigen–specific immunotherapy tecemotide could prolong overall survival in patients with unresectable stage III non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) who had...
As reported in The Lancet Oncology by Gatta et al, the population-based EUROCARE-5 study has shown improved survival for all childhood cancers combined in Europe between 1999–2001 and 2005–2007 and persistence of regional survival disparities. Study Details The study involved analysis ...
Interim phase I/II clinical trial data for VAL-083—a bifunctional DNA alkylator that crosses the blood-brain barrier with preferential accumulation in brain tumor tissue—in patients with recurrent glioblastoma multiforme were presented by Shih et al at the 4th Quadrennial Meeting of the ...
Advanced imaging techniques may be able to distinguish which patients' tumors will respond to treatment with antiangiogenic drugs and which will not. In a report published online in PNAS, researchers studied patients with newly diagnosed glioblastoma who were treated with the antiangiogenic agent...
A phase III trial (Radiation Therapy Oncology Group [RTOG] 0525; N = 833) comparing dose-dense vs standard-dose temozolomide maintenance in newly diagnosed glioblastoma showed no differences in overall survival or progression-free survival between treatments. A substudy of the trial, reported in...
Dose-dense temozolomide results in depletion of O6-methylguanine-DNA methyltransferase (MGMT)—a potential determinant of treatment response—in blood mononuclear cells and possibly in tumors. In a phase III trial (Radiation Therapy Oncology Group [RTOG] 0525) reported in the Journal ...
In a phase II trial reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Patrick G. Morris, MD, of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, and colleagues assessed the efficacy of rituximab (Rituxan), methotrexate, procarbazine (Matulane), and vincristine (R-MPV) followed by consolidation reduced-dose ...
Scientists from The Scripps Research Institute have identified a new drug candidate for an inherited form of cancer with no known cure. The new study showed the drug candidate—known as FRAX97—slowed the proliferation and progression of tumor cells in animal models of neurofibromatosis...
When treated with stereotactic radiosurgery that is not combined with whole-brain radiotherapy, adult brain cancer patients who were 50 years old and younger were found to have improved survival, according to research presented on Sunday, September 22, at the American Society for Radiation...
When used to treat pediatric patients with intracranial malignant tumors, proton therapy may limit the toxicity of radiation therapy while preserving tumor control, according to research presented on Sunday, September 22, at the American Society for Radiation Oncology’s 55th Annual Meeting...
Researchers from University of Rochester Medical Center have shown scientifically what many women report anecdotally: that tamoxifen is toxic to cells of the brain and central nervous system (CNS), producing mental fogginess similar to “chemo brain.” In the study, published in the...
Valganciclovir (Valcyte), a drug used to treat cytomegalovirus (CMV) eye infections in people with HIV/AIDS, may lengthen survival in patients with glioblastoma, a Swedish study has found. The researchers evaluated 50 patients with glioblastoma who received valganciclovir as an add-on to standard...
A new laser-based technology may make brain tumor surgery much more accurate, allowing surgeons to tell cancer tissue from normal brain at the microscopic level while they are operating, and avoid leaving behind cells that could spawn a new tumor. In a new paper published in Science Translational...
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...
CNS-directed chemotherapy and cranial radiation therapy for childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia or lymphoma have neurotoxic effects. In a study reported in Journal of Clinical Oncology, Ilse Schuitema, MSc, of Leiden University, The Netherlands, and colleagues evaluated white matter changes ...
A new population-based study has found that patients with glioblastoma who died in 2010, after the FDA approval of bevacizumab (Avastin), had lived significantly longer than patients who died of the disease in 2008, prior to the conditional approval of the drug for the treatment of brain...
A drug recently approved for use in multiple myeloma is now being tested for its ability to fight central nervous system (CNS) lymphoma, a deadly cancer of the immune system that can affect the brain, spinal cord and fluid, and eyes. The clinical trial, now open at the three campuses of Mayo Clinic ...
In a phase III study (REGAL trial) reported in Journal of Clinical Oncology, Tracy T. Batchelor, MD, MPH, of Massachusetts General Hospital, and colleagues compared oral monotherapy with the pan-VEGF tyrosine kinase inhibitor cediranib and the combination of cediranib plus lomustine (CeeNu) vs...
A new way of analyzing data acquired in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) appears to be able to identify whether or not tumors are responding to antiangiogenesis therapy, which may help physicians determine the most appropriate treatments for patients. In a report published online in Nature...
Scientists have long believed that healthy brain cells, once damaged by radiation designed to kill brain tumors, cannot regenerate. But new research in mice suggests that neural stem cells, the body's source of new brain cells, are resistant to radiation, and can be roused from a hibernation-like...
A team of researchers at the Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center at Columbia University Medical Center has identified 18 new genes responsible for driving glioblastoma multiforme, the most common—and most aggressive—form of brain cancer in adults. The study was published online...
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...
Researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital have used digital versions of a standard molecular biology tool to detect a common tumor-associated mutation in the cerebrospinal fluid of patients with brain tumors. In a report published in Molecular Therapy – Nucleic Acids, the...
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 open-label phase III trial (ASPECT) reported in Lancet Oncology, Manfred Westphal, MD, of University Hospital Eppendorf in Hamburg, and colleagues assessed the effects of locally applied adenovirus-mediated gene therapy with sitimagene ceradenovec followed by intravenous ganciclovir after...
The NCI-60 cell lines, which represent cancers of lung, colon, brain, ovary, breast, prostate, and kidney as well as leukemia and melanoma, are the most frequently studied human tumor cell lines in cancer research and have generated the most extensive cancer pharmacology database worldwide. As...
A combination of the myxoma virus and the immune suppressant rapamycin can kill glioblastoma multiforme, the most common and deadliest malignant brain tumor, according to new research published in Neuro-Oncology. Study lead author Peter A. Forsyth, MD, Chair of the Neuro-oncology Program at Moffitt ...
A study led by researchers at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James) has identified an abnormal metabolic pathway that drives cancer cell growth in a particular glioblastoma...
A study led by researchers at The Ohio State University Comprehensive Cancer Center – Arthur G. James Cancer Hospital and Richard J. Solove Research Institute (OSUCCC – James) and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute suggests that cytomegalovirus, a virus that infects most adults in the United...
A randomized phase III study found no improvement in overall survival after the addition of bevacizumab (Avastin) to standard first-line chemoradiation for glioblastoma. Patients who received bevacizumab also experienced more side effects compared to those treated with chemoradiation alone. The...
The NeuroBlate Thermal Therapy System provides a new, safe, and minimally invasive procedure for treating recurrent glioblastoma, according to the first-in-human study of the system. The study, published online today in the Journal of Neurosurgery, was written by lead author Andrew Sloan, MD,...