Current Issue : July - September Volume : 2019 Issue Number : 3 Articles : 6 Articles
When a person is diagnosed to have cancer, that he has reached the terminal stages of his illness, he suffers the most. Adding to this stress patient and the family members have a difficult time to decide over the care of the patient with advanced cancer, to prefer a hospice or care at home. Assessment of the quality of life (QOL) of advanced cancer patients can provide helpful information on disease and treatment related effects and also on patients own experiences. Hence the investigator felt the need to do the study to compare the quality of life of the advanced cancer patients in hospice vs. home care. The study was conducted among 90 (30 in each group) advanced cancer patients in Shanti Avedna Hospice in Delhi and Follow up patients of CANSUPPORT in their own residence. Longitudinal follow up research design was used and the samples were selected by purposive sampling. The demographic variables were used to assess the sample characteristics and European Organization of research and the Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire -Cancer 30 to measure quality of life on advanced cancer patients. The study revealed that in Global Health Scale (GHS), the higher score (63.43) was in hospice and when hospice (p<0.05) and NGO assisted home care (p<0.05) were compared with home care alone GHS score had significant difference. In symptom scales, Hospice had lower score. Hence the study concluded that Patients who were in Hospice scored significantly better in Quality of Life, as compared to NGO assisted home care and home care alone....
Natural killer (NK) cells have received a lot of attention in recent years for the roles they play\nin immunity and particularly in antitumor immune responses. Although defects in NK cell functions\nare recognized as important mechanisms for immune evasion of malignant cells, molecular pathways\nregulating NK cell dysfunction and exhaustion in cancer are largely unknown. Here we tested\nwhether the c-myc proto-oncogene, known to promote cell proliferation, growth, differentiation, and\napoptosis by regulating the expression of numerous target genes, may be involved in the mechanism\nof NK cell abnormalities in patients with lung and gastric cancer. Analysis of c-myc mRNA and\nprotein expression in peripheral blood NK cells, mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) activity,\ncell cycle, and cell longevity revealed a significantly decreased expression of c-myc mRNA and\nprotein and mitotic arrest of NK cells in different phases of cell cycle. In addition, a significant\ndecrease of NK cell death was also detected. These data allow the suggestion that defects of NK\ncell-mediated tumor surveillance may be associated with disturbed c-myc expression in NK cells in\ncancer patients. A better understanding of the mechanisms of NK cell dysfunction in cancer will help\nin the NK cell-mediated therapeutic eradication of primary and metastatic cancer cells and prolong\npatient survival....
Pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) is a lethal disease. PDAC is the fourth leading\ncause of death in the United States and Japan based on epidemiological data. Early detection of\nPDAC is very important to improve the prognosis of PDAC. Early detection of pancreatic ductal\nadenocarcinoma (PDAC) requires further examination after selecting cases with risk factors for the\ncondition, such as family history, hereditary pancreatic carcinoma syndrome, intraductal papillary\nmucinous neoplasms, or chronic pancreatitis. The Japan Study Group on the Early Detection of\nPancreatic Cancer has investigated and clarified the clinicopathological features for the early\ndiagnosis of PDAC. In Japan, an algorithm for the early diagnosis of PDAC, which utilized the\ncooperation of local clinics and regional general hospitals, has been a breakthrough in the detection\nof early-stage PDAC. Further approaches for the early diagnosis of PDAC are warranted....
Current strategies to determine tumor * normal (TN)-hybrid cells among human cancer\ncells include the detection of hematopoietic markers and other mesodermal markers on tumor cells or\nthe presence of donor DNA in cancer samples from patients who had previously received an allogenic\nbone marrow transplant. By doing so, several studies have demonstrated that TN-hybrid cells could\nbe found in human cancers. However, a prerequisite of this cell fusion search strategy is that such\nmarkers are stably expressed by TN-hybrid cells over time. However, cell fusion is a potent inducer\nof genomic instability, and TN-hybrid cells may lose these cell fusion markers, thereby becoming\nindistinguishable from nonfused tumor cells. In addition, hybrid cells can evolve from homotypic\nfusion events between tumor cells or from heterotypic fusion events between tumor cells and normal\ncells possessing similar markers, which would also be indistinguishable from nonfused tumor cells.\nSuch indistinguishable or invisible hybrid cells will be referred to as dark matter hybrids, which\ncannot as yet be detected and quantified, but which contribute to tumor growth and progression....
Colorectal cancer is the source of one of the most common cancer-related deaths\nworldwide, where the main cause of patient mortality remains metastasis. The aim of this study\nwas to determine the role of CCL7 (chemokine (C-C motif) ligand 7) in tumor progression and\nfinding whether it could predict survival of colorectal cancer patients. Initially, our study focused\non the crosstalk between mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) and CT26 colon carcinoma cells and\nresulted in identifying CCL7 as a chemokine upregulated in CT26 colon cancer cells cocultured with\nMSCs, compared with CT26 in monoculture in vitro. Moreover, we showed that MSCs enhance CT26\ntumor cell proliferation and migration. We analyzed the effect of CCL7 overexpression on tumor\nprogression in a murine CT26 model, where cells overexpressing CCL7 accelerated the early phase\nof tumor growth and caused higher lung metastasis rates compared with control mice. Microarray\nanalysis revealed that tumors overexpressing CCL7 had lower expression of immunoglobulins\nproduced by B lymphocytes. Additionally, using Jh mutant mice, we confirmed that in the CT26\nmodel, CCL7 has an immunoglobulin-, and thereby, B-cell-dependent effect on metastasis\nformation. Finally, higher expression of CCL7 receptor CCR2 (C-C chemokine receptor type 2) was\nassociated with shorter overall survival of colorectal cancer patients. Altogether, we showed that\nCCL7 is essentially involved in the progression of colorectal cancer in a CT26 mouse model and that\nthe expression of its receptor CCR2 could be related to a different outcome pattern of patients with\ncolorectal carcinoma....
Infections may constitute a serious complication in patients with chronic lymphocytic\nleukemia (CLL). New treatment agents including obinutuzumab and ibrutinib have improved the\nprogression-free survival in CLL, and data suggest a similar overall infection risk and a limited risk\nof opportunistic infections when compared to standard chemo-immunotherapy. Nevertheless,\ncases of opportunistic infections including non-tuberculous mycobacterial (NTM) in CLL patients\nhave recently been published. We present a case of a 74-year old man with extensive prior CLL\ntreatment history, including most recently obinutuzumab. He developed an abscess of the psoas\nmuscle and inguinal lymphadenopathy. An inguinal node biopsy specimen showed infection with\nMycobacterium avium, confirmed by broad-spectrum mycobacterial PCR, M. avium-specific PCR,\nand mycobacterial culture. This case and our literature review suggest that physicians should be\naware of opportunistic infections in patients with CLL. Diagnostic differentiation from CLL disease\nprogression, Richterâ??s transformation to aggressive lymphoma, and secondary malignancy relies\non histological and appropriate microbiological studies from biopsy material of affected organs.\nInfection prophylaxis in CLL should be considered, including vaccinations and intravenous\nimmune globulin replacement....
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