Colorectal Cancer News in Brief: September 25

Kate Murphy — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 12:37:08 +0000

Briefly: Randomized research found that radiation treatment to the entire brain after surgery for tumors that had spread to the brain didn’t improve either survival or the time that patients remained able to function independently. Mice with muscle wasting and fat loss from cancer benefited from a commonly used diabetes drug.

In other headlines, Katie Couric received an award from Fordham University and called her work with colorectal cancer awareness “her greatest achievement.” A panel at the FDA has recommended approval of a new formulation of OxyContin that is less easy to tamper with. Online registration for the October 4th Strides for Life Walk/Run closes on October 1.

Research Reports

Whole brain radiotherapy (WBRT) after surgery or focused brain radiation to treat brain tumors that have spread into the brain from other cancer sites doesn’t improve either overall survival time or the time that patients are able to function independently. It did extend time before cancer got worse within the brain and prevented some deaths directly caused by pressure within the brain compared to patients who were only observed after their initial surgery. R. Soffietti reported the results of a randomized study over more than 350 patients with brain metastases at the ECCO/ESMO Multidisciplinary Congress in Berlin.
Mice with colon tumors treated with the diabetes drug rosiglitazone (Avandia®) gained weight despite having developed insulin resistance and initial weight loss. Mice with cancer who didn’t receive the drug lost weight and fat tissue. Scientist theorize that insulin resistance, which contributes to obesity and type 2 diabetes, actually is part of the muscle wasting and severe fat loss in cancer patients known as cancer cachexia. Martha Belury from the Department of Human Nutrition at the Ohio State University says that is it too early to know if the drug would combat cachexia in humans. Her team’s research is reported online in the International Journal of Cancer. More information about the study is available in an OSU press release.

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CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric says that her work to wipe out colorectal cancer has been her greatest accomplishment. Accepting the Brien McMahon Award for Public Service at Fordham University, Couric recalls her desperate search for ” some kind of magic bullet that would make Jay well” during her husband Jay Monahan’s battle with colon cancer. After Monahan’s death, Couric had a colonoscopy on morning TV to raise awareness of the test and colorectal cancer prevention. She founded the National Colorectal Cancer Research Alliance and helped establish the Jay Monahan Center for Gastrointestinal Health in New York City.
A joint meeting of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) pain and medication safety panels on September 24, 2009 recommended approval of a new formulation of the opiate painkiller OxyContin which is designed to make it harder to abuse. Currently OxyContin can be crushed into power which abusers can snort, smoke, or dissolve in water and inject providing a powerful, heroin-like effect. The new pills are coated with resin which makes them very difficult to crush. Dissolved in water, they form a gel. If approved by the FDA, Purdue Pharma, manufacturers of OxyContin, will no longer ship the older product but begin distributing the tamper-proof medication, marketing it as a “safer” version. An article , September 24, 2009. about the FDA panel decision written by Emily Walker was published on MedPage Today.
Online registration for the annual Strides for Life/Get Your Rear in Gear Walk/Run closes on October 1, 2009. Strides for Life honors the memory of Dylan Cappel, who died of colon cancer at the age of 23 while training for a spot on the US Olympic rowing team. The Walk and Run will be held on October 4th at Lake Merced in San Francisco, sponsored by the Strides for Life Foundation.

Colorectal Cancer News in Brief: May 23

Kate Murphy — Sun, 24 May 2009 16:35:50 +0000

Research this week finds that people with severe cancer weight loss get less benefit from fentanyl pain patches and explores why people with Down Syndrome have less cancer.

In other headlines, shut-down of a Canadian nuclear reactor threatens the supply of medical isotopes used in many cancer tests. Free drug samples may do more harm than good, and CT colonography finds cancers and other serious conditions outside the colon in about 2 or 3 out of 100 tests. Finally, we provide a link to a Cancer.Net podcast with information about what to expect from your colonoscopy.

Research Reports

Patients with cancer cachexia or loss of weight, muscle mass, and fat due to cancer had lower blood levels of fentanyl two and three days into using a fentanyl patch for pain management than did normal weight patients. Cachectic patients had significantly thinner upper arm folds with less fat but there was no difference in local blood flow, sweating, or skin temperature. Pain clinic researchers in Helsinki concluded that, “Absorption of transdermal fentanyl is impaired in cachectic patients compared with that of normal weight cancer pain patients.” Tarji Heiskan and team reported their research in Pain online May 13, 2009.
People with Down Syndrome are rarely diagnosed with solid tumor cancers, and researchers at Children’s Hospital in Boston have found a reason. Children with Down Syndrome are born with an extra copy of chromosome 21, and additional protein controlled by an extra DSCR1 gene acts within cells themselves to suppress VEGF (vascular endothelial growth factor) preventing potential cancers from developing the blood supply they need to grow and spread. Both cell and mouse studies confirm the activity of DSCR1 proteins to block angiogenesis. The discovery is reported in a letter from lead author to the journal Nature published online May 20, 2009. More detailed information about the study is available from Science Daily, May 21, 2009.

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The shut-down of a Canadian nuclear reactor in Chalk River, Ontario to repair leaking heavy water has imperiled millions of medical imaging tests in the United States. The reactor supplies the radioactive isotope molybdenum-99, injected into patients during nuclear medicine studies. The Canadian reactor is one of only five worldwide that produce medical isotopes, and it provides them for half of hospitals and clinics in the United States. Nuclear medicine experts predict that costs will rise, patients will have to be switched to less accurate testing, and some patients will not be able to have testing at all. The reactor closure is expected to last at least a month and probably longer. Julie Steenhuysen has written about the reactor problems on Reuters Health.
Health policy researchers Susan Chimonas and Jerome P. Kassirer discuss the negative impact of free drug samples in an essay on PLoS Medicine. They review research that shows only a third of samples go to low-income patients and patients in the highest income categories were most likely to receive free samples. Many samples are diverted for personal use by health professionals. Low-income patients given starter packs of medicines frequently do not fill prescriptions to continue them and have no oversight by a pharmacist. Samples raise the cost of health care with patients who receive them having higher out-of-pocket costs than those who don’t. Estimates are that free samples are worth about $16 billion retail dollars annually in the US. The complete essay by Chimonas and Kassirir is available on PLoS Medicine, published May 12, 2009.
CT colonography can find cancers outside of the colon. In fact, in a study of over 10,000 people who were screened with CTC, 38 non-colorectal cancers were discovered — more than the 21 colorectal cancers. Most were in the kidney, but lung cancer and lymphomas were also found. Such discoveries are rare. Dr. Perry Pickhardt, discussing them at the 2009 International Symposium on Multidetector-Row CT, pointed out that they occur about once in every 300 CTC procedures. In addition, other serious medical conditions can be seen including unsuspected abdominal aneuryms. However, while a suspicious problem occurs in about 1 out of 10 CTC exams, only 2 or 3 of them will actually be something serious needing treatment.
Wonder what happens during a colonoscopy? Cancer.Net, the patient and consumer information web site of the American Society of Clinical Oncology, has a podcast that can help. Colonoscopy — What to Expect.

Fight Colorectal Cancer » cachexia

Colorectal Cancer News in Brief: September 25

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Colorectal Cancer News in Brief: May 23

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