The latest in precision prevention news, curated for CancerIQ's community of oncologists, genetic counselors, breast centers, primary care providers, and anyone interested in staying ahead of cancer.
- Getting closer to a vaccine for cancer via The Washington Post
More preventive cancer vaccines are a long time away, but new science may be the key to making them a reality. Olivera Finn, distinguished professor of immunology at the University of Pittsburgh and her team were the first to discover a tumor-specific antigen, MUC1, and have developed a vaccine to target it.
The vaccine "showed a strong response from the immune system in clinical trials in patients with premalignant colon polyps, leading them to believe the vaccine could help prevent the growth of new polyps and keep existing ones from turning cancerous.... [it] reduced polyp recurrence rates by 38 percent in their clinical trial." - Netflix-Style Algorithm Builds Blueprint of Cancer Genomes via UC San Diego
“Understanding how these large-scale genomic events arise will help us regain an advantage over cancer.” The authors, from University of California, San Diego - School of Medicine and UCL of a new paper on cancer genomes, hope that their research will “help doctors offer better and more personalized” cancer care. - Screening Mammography Rates Drop in Breast Cancer Survivors via BreastCancer.Org
"'I was surprised that we saw declines in mammography use among patients who were continuing to see their cancer specialists,' lead researcher Kathryn P. Lowry, MD, assistant professor of radiology at the University of Washington, said in a statement... We also need additional studies to better understand the barriers that are leading to fewer mammograms." -
Changing a Family’s Fate: Genetic Testing Empowers Cancer Survivor to Help His Loved Ones via University of Rochester Medical Center"Once he got the news, he encouraged his three adult sons and his brothers to get genetic testing. One brother and one son ended up having the variant. Those family members can now get more frequent screenings to hopefully catch any potential cancers earlier."Precision prevention through genomics means long-term managed care plans will help this family's providers at UR Medicine stay ahead of Lynch Syndrome and hereditary cancer.
- A Cancer Trial’s Unexpected Result: Remission in Every Patient via The New York Times
Incredible science came out of this month's ASCO Annual Meeting, including in colon cancer precision oncology from Andrea Cercek at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.
"Dr. Luis A. Diaz Jr. of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, an author of a paper published ... in the New England Journal of Medicine .... said he knew of no other study in which a treatment completely obliterated a cancer in every patient. 'I believe this is the first time this has happened in the history of cancer,' Dr. Diaz said." - Rapid, AI-Based, Genome Mapping Discovers Cancer Driving Mutations Genetic Engineering & Biology News
A team at MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) is harnessing AI to uncover cancer drivers and power precision medicine approaches.
Their model can be utilized "once for a given cancer type, and it learns the mutation rate everywhere across the genome simultaneously for that particular type of cancer."
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