Pancreatic cancer(PDAC) is an aggressive and chemoresistant disease, representing the fourth cause of cancer related deaths in western countries. Majority of patients have unresectable, locally advanced or metastatic ...Pancreatic cancer(PDAC) is an aggressive and chemoresistant disease, representing the fourth cause of cancer related deaths in western countries. Majority of patients have unresectable, locally advanced or metastatic disease at time of diagnosis and the 5-year survival rate in these conditions is extremely low. For more than a decade gemcitabine has been the cornerstone of metastatic PDAC treatment, although survival benefit was very poor. PDAC cells are surrounded by an intense desmoplastic reaction that may create a barrier to the drugs penetration within the tumor. Recently PDAC stroma has been addressed as a potential therapeutic target. Nano albumin bound(Nab)-paclitaxel is an innovative molecule depleting tumor stroma, through interaction between albumin and secreted protein acidic and rich in cysteine. Addition of nab-paclitaxel to gemcitabine has showed activity and efficacy in metastatic PDAC first-line treatment improving survival and overall response rate vs gemcitabine alone in the MPACT phase Ⅲ study. This combination represents one of the standards of care in advanced PDAC therapy and is suitable to a broader spectrum of patients compared to other schedules. Nab-paclitaxel is under investigation as a backbone of chemotherapy in novel combinations with target agents or immunotherapy in locally advanced or metastatic PDAC. In this article, we provide an updated and critical overview about the role of nab-paclitaxel in PDAC treatment based on the latest advances in preclinical and clinical research. Furthermore, we focus on the use of nab-paclitaxel within the context of metastatic PDAC treatment landscape and we discuss about future implications in the light of current clinical ongoing trials.展开更多
Objective: Papanicolou (Pap) smear screening has dramatically reduced the incidence of invasive cervical cancer worldwide. Pap smear screening is still not widely available in developing countries and therefore cannot...Objective: Papanicolou (Pap) smear screening has dramatically reduced the incidence of invasive cervical cancer worldwide. Pap smear screening is still not widely available in developing countries and therefore cannot be used as mass screening tool. This study was designed to establish the role of Pap smear as a routine investigation for females presented to gynecological department. Methods: It was a hospital based study. Patients attending with complaints including irregular vaginal bleeding, vagina discharge, dyspareunia, low backache or lower abdominal pain and primary or secondary infertility were included in the study. All these patients underwent pap smear. Results: Age of females was 25 to 60 years. Ninety females had dysplasia. Mild to moderate dysplasia was positive in 84 females. Six patients had severe dysplasia suspicious for squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) which was confirmed as invasive SCC on biopsy. All patients with mild to moderate dysplasia were regularly followed at 4 to 6 months. Thirty patients were lost during follow up. Forty had negative smear at 6 months, while fourteen having persistent dysplasia on repeated pap smears were referred for biopsies. Histopathology confirmed invasive SCC in five patients while chronic cervicitis was reported in nine patients. Only two of screened patients with high suspicion for cancer showed false negative results. Directed biopsies done in these confirmed invasive SCC. Conclusion: Pap smear is a useful, simple, non-invasive and reliable screening tool for cervical cancer. It may be practiced as a routine investigation in outpatients in developing countries, where mass screening is not available.展开更多
Despite great efforts in experimental and clinical research, the prognosis of pancreatic cancer (PC) has not changed significantly for decades. Detection of pre-invasive lesions or early-stage PC with small resectable...Despite great efforts in experimental and clinical research, the prognosis of pancreatic cancer (PC) has not changed significantly for decades. Detection of pre-invasive lesions or early-stage PC with small resectable cancers in asymptomatic individuals remains one of the most promising approaches to substantially improve the overall outcome of PC. Therefore, screening programs have been proposed to identify curable lesions especially in individuals with a familial or genetic predisposition for PC. In this regard, Canto et al recently contributed an important article comparing computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, and endoscopic ultrasound for the screening of 216 asymptomatic high-risk individuals (HRI). Pancreatic lesions were detected in 92 of 216 asymptomatic HRI (42.6%). The high diagnostic yield in this study raises several questions that need to be answered of which two will be discussed in detail in this commentary: First: which imaging test should be performed? Second and most importantly: what are we doing with incidentally detected pancreatic lesions? Which ones can be observed and which ones need to be resected?展开更多
Objective The aim of this study was to assess the value of palliative local treatment of incurable metastatic lesions in colorectal cancer(CRC) patients receiving chemotherapy plus bevacizumab.Methods Data of 105 pati...Objective The aim of this study was to assess the value of palliative local treatment of incurable metastatic lesions in colorectal cancer(CRC) patients receiving chemotherapy plus bevacizumab.Methods Data of 105 patients with histologically confirmed synchronous or metachronous metastatic CRC who received bevacizumab treatment from January 1, 2011 to January 31, 2017 were retrospectively reviewed. Sixteen(15%) patients who were treated with bevacizumab for less than 4 cycles were excluded, and finally, 89(85%) patients were enrolled. Among them, 33(37%) patients who received palliative local treatment were categorized into the palliative local treatment group, and the remaining 56(63%) patients were categorized into the chemotherapy plus bevacizumab group. The primary endpoint was overall survival(OS), which was calculated using Kaplan-Meier survival analyses. Factors possibly influencing survival were evaluated by univariate and multivariate analyses. Adverse events(AEs) were graded according to Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events, version 4.0. Grades 1–2 and 3–4 AEs of the two groups were compared and analyzed using the Fisher's exact test and χ~2 analysis.Results The median follow-up period was 20.4 months, ranging from 1 to 60 months. The median OS in the palliative local treatment group was 36.3 months(95% CI, 33.5–39.2), and that in the chemotherapy plus bevacizumab group was 20.5 months(95% CI, 17.6–23.4). Both the univariate(HR 0.13, 95% CI, 0.05–0.30, P < 0.001) and multivariate(HR 0.16, 95% CI, 0.07–0.39, P < 0.001) analyses showed that the addition of palliative local treatment could prolong survival compared with chemotherapy plus bevacizumab alone. There were no significant differences in the rates of common chemotherapy-or bevacizumab-related AEs between the two groups.Conclusion These findings suggest palliative local treatment is an effective and safe method for treating patients with incurable metastatic CRC receiving chemotherapy plus bevacizumab.展开更多
Cancer-associated retinopathy (CAR) typically has a sudden or progressive onset of severe visual loss and an ominous association with an occult malignancy which contains breast cancer. Pathologically, CAR is the degen...Cancer-associated retinopathy (CAR) typically has a sudden or progressive onset of severe visual loss and an ominous association with an occult malignancy which contains breast cancer. Pathologically, CAR is the degeneration of photoreceptors. But the precise mechanism has not been fully established, CAR may result from autoimmune mediated apoptosis. And in recent years, there also have been some results demonstrating that tumor derived angiogenic factors such as VEGF may also confer the development of CAR, which may offer novel avenues for the therapeutic intervention in CAR. Early initiation of immunosuppressive therapy is critical for vision preservation. Future developments in rapid identification and longitudinal quantification of antibody levels would enable individualized management in these patients. The goal of this review was to analyze the epidemiology, the clinical features, the diagnosis and management of retinopathy in the context of recent advances in the elucidation of breast cancer-associated retinopathy (BCAR) pathogenesis.展开更多
文摘Pancreatic cancer(PDAC) is an aggressive and chemoresistant disease, representing the fourth cause of cancer related deaths in western countries. Majority of patients have unresectable, locally advanced or metastatic disease at time of diagnosis and the 5-year survival rate in these conditions is extremely low. For more than a decade gemcitabine has been the cornerstone of metastatic PDAC treatment, although survival benefit was very poor. PDAC cells are surrounded by an intense desmoplastic reaction that may create a barrier to the drugs penetration within the tumor. Recently PDAC stroma has been addressed as a potential therapeutic target. Nano albumin bound(Nab)-paclitaxel is an innovative molecule depleting tumor stroma, through interaction between albumin and secreted protein acidic and rich in cysteine. Addition of nab-paclitaxel to gemcitabine has showed activity and efficacy in metastatic PDAC first-line treatment improving survival and overall response rate vs gemcitabine alone in the MPACT phase Ⅲ study. This combination represents one of the standards of care in advanced PDAC therapy and is suitable to a broader spectrum of patients compared to other schedules. Nab-paclitaxel is under investigation as a backbone of chemotherapy in novel combinations with target agents or immunotherapy in locally advanced or metastatic PDAC. In this article, we provide an updated and critical overview about the role of nab-paclitaxel in PDAC treatment based on the latest advances in preclinical and clinical research. Furthermore, we focus on the use of nab-paclitaxel within the context of metastatic PDAC treatment landscape and we discuss about future implications in the light of current clinical ongoing trials.
文摘Objective: Papanicolou (Pap) smear screening has dramatically reduced the incidence of invasive cervical cancer worldwide. Pap smear screening is still not widely available in developing countries and therefore cannot be used as mass screening tool. This study was designed to establish the role of Pap smear as a routine investigation for females presented to gynecological department. Methods: It was a hospital based study. Patients attending with complaints including irregular vaginal bleeding, vagina discharge, dyspareunia, low backache or lower abdominal pain and primary or secondary infertility were included in the study. All these patients underwent pap smear. Results: Age of females was 25 to 60 years. Ninety females had dysplasia. Mild to moderate dysplasia was positive in 84 females. Six patients had severe dysplasia suspicious for squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) which was confirmed as invasive SCC on biopsy. All patients with mild to moderate dysplasia were regularly followed at 4 to 6 months. Thirty patients were lost during follow up. Forty had negative smear at 6 months, while fourteen having persistent dysplasia on repeated pap smears were referred for biopsies. Histopathology confirmed invasive SCC in five patients while chronic cervicitis was reported in nine patients. Only two of screened patients with high suspicion for cancer showed false negative results. Directed biopsies done in these confirmed invasive SCC. Conclusion: Pap smear is a useful, simple, non-invasive and reliable screening tool for cervical cancer. It may be practiced as a routine investigation in outpatients in developing countries, where mass screening is not available.
文摘Despite great efforts in experimental and clinical research, the prognosis of pancreatic cancer (PC) has not changed significantly for decades. Detection of pre-invasive lesions or early-stage PC with small resectable cancers in asymptomatic individuals remains one of the most promising approaches to substantially improve the overall outcome of PC. Therefore, screening programs have been proposed to identify curable lesions especially in individuals with a familial or genetic predisposition for PC. In this regard, Canto et al recently contributed an important article comparing computed tomography, magnetic resonance imaging, and endoscopic ultrasound for the screening of 216 asymptomatic high-risk individuals (HRI). Pancreatic lesions were detected in 92 of 216 asymptomatic HRI (42.6%). The high diagnostic yield in this study raises several questions that need to be answered of which two will be discussed in detail in this commentary: First: which imaging test should be performed? Second and most importantly: what are we doing with incidentally detected pancreatic lesions? Which ones can be observed and which ones need to be resected?
文摘Objective The aim of this study was to assess the value of palliative local treatment of incurable metastatic lesions in colorectal cancer(CRC) patients receiving chemotherapy plus bevacizumab.Methods Data of 105 patients with histologically confirmed synchronous or metachronous metastatic CRC who received bevacizumab treatment from January 1, 2011 to January 31, 2017 were retrospectively reviewed. Sixteen(15%) patients who were treated with bevacizumab for less than 4 cycles were excluded, and finally, 89(85%) patients were enrolled. Among them, 33(37%) patients who received palliative local treatment were categorized into the palliative local treatment group, and the remaining 56(63%) patients were categorized into the chemotherapy plus bevacizumab group. The primary endpoint was overall survival(OS), which was calculated using Kaplan-Meier survival analyses. Factors possibly influencing survival were evaluated by univariate and multivariate analyses. Adverse events(AEs) were graded according to Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events, version 4.0. Grades 1–2 and 3–4 AEs of the two groups were compared and analyzed using the Fisher's exact test and χ~2 analysis.Results The median follow-up period was 20.4 months, ranging from 1 to 60 months. The median OS in the palliative local treatment group was 36.3 months(95% CI, 33.5–39.2), and that in the chemotherapy plus bevacizumab group was 20.5 months(95% CI, 17.6–23.4). Both the univariate(HR 0.13, 95% CI, 0.05–0.30, P < 0.001) and multivariate(HR 0.16, 95% CI, 0.07–0.39, P < 0.001) analyses showed that the addition of palliative local treatment could prolong survival compared with chemotherapy plus bevacizumab alone. There were no significant differences in the rates of common chemotherapy-or bevacizumab-related AEs between the two groups.Conclusion These findings suggest palliative local treatment is an effective and safe method for treating patients with incurable metastatic CRC receiving chemotherapy plus bevacizumab.
文摘Cancer-associated retinopathy (CAR) typically has a sudden or progressive onset of severe visual loss and an ominous association with an occult malignancy which contains breast cancer. Pathologically, CAR is the degeneration of photoreceptors. But the precise mechanism has not been fully established, CAR may result from autoimmune mediated apoptosis. And in recent years, there also have been some results demonstrating that tumor derived angiogenic factors such as VEGF may also confer the development of CAR, which may offer novel avenues for the therapeutic intervention in CAR. Early initiation of immunosuppressive therapy is critical for vision preservation. Future developments in rapid identification and longitudinal quantification of antibody levels would enable individualized management in these patients. The goal of this review was to analyze the epidemiology, the clinical features, the diagnosis and management of retinopathy in the context of recent advances in the elucidation of breast cancer-associated retinopathy (BCAR) pathogenesis.
