Back when D.N. Chadha, MA, was a pharmaceutical executive meeting with Jeffrey Meyerhardt, MD, MPH, in 2002, he never imagined he’d see the physician years later – this time for rectal cancer treatment. “The name rang a bell, and as soon as I saw him, I knew,” says Chadha, 74, of his first appointment with … Read more
A traditional biopsy is a test in which a piece of tissue is removed from a patient for analysis in a laboratory. A pathologist examines the tissue under a microscope, noting the shape, structure, and internal activity of the cells to determine whether the cells are cancerous and, if so, what type of cancer they … Read more
Patients and Dana-Farber researchers alike welcomed this week’s Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval of a new drug for a potentially fatal side effect of stem cell transplants. The approval means patients can receive the drug, defibrotide, as standard therapy for hepatic veno-occlusive disease (VOD) of the liver, a dangerous condition that sometimes follows transplantation … Read more
Colorectal cancer is the third most common cancer diagnosed in women and men in the United States. While surgery and chemotherapy are the mainstays of treatment for colorectal cancer, some patients with the disease can be treated with immunotherapy. What is immunotherapy? Immunotherapy harnesses the individual’s immune defenses to fight cancer. In the case of … Read more
Ronaldo de Oliveira was close to death. The 33-year-old father of two young children had been diagnosed with myeloid sarcoma, a rare form of leukemia that worsened despite treatment with six different chemotherapy regimens. His wife pleaded with his oncologist, Richard Stone, MD, director of the Adult Leukemia Program at Dana-Farber, to find something else … Read more
This blog post was originally published on the Cancer Research UK science blog. It is reposted here with minor edits. In a cabinet in London’s British Museum nestles a 5,300 year-old wedged-shaped tablet called a cuneiform. On its surface is scrawled one of the earliest forms of written language in the world. And it’s a … Read more
Although they may seem like foreign invaders, cancer cells develop out of normal body cells and tissues. Over a period of years, damage to the DNA of healthy cells disrupts their orderly growth, leading to the formation of malignant tumors. Cancer cells may contain thousands of mutations — alterations in their genetic code — but … Read more
This post originally appeared on Vector, Boston Children’s Hospital’s science and clinical innovation blog. It’s long been a mystery why some of our cells can have mutations associated with cancer, yet are not truly cancerous. Now researchers have, for the first time, watched a cancer spread from a single cell in a live animal, and … Read more
The last two years have been very exciting for blood cancer research; many new targeted therapies and immunotherapies are improving treatment outcomes for patients with lymphoma, leukemia and multiple myeloma. “We’re starting to see a lot of hematologic malignancies benefit from immunotherapy,” says Irene Ghobrial, MD. “The excitement is there for so many trials and … Read more
Medically reviewed by Gordon Freeman, PhD New drugs that stimulate the patient’s immune system to attack tumors have achieved some dramatic and long-lasting benefits in several forms of cancer. A few drugs are already approved for wide use and many more are in the research pipeline. Because these immunotherapy agents work differently than chemotherapy, the … Read more
Allison Schablein seems an unlikely candidate to teach medicine to Mark Kieran. She’s an 8–year-old New Hampshire second grader who loves basketball, hip hop, acrobatic dancing and jewelry. He’s a pediatric neuro-oncologist with a PhD in molecular biology, not to mention decades of clinical and research experience. But teach Kieran, Allison does. In December 2012, … Read more
Cancers of the cervix are diagnosed in more than 12,000 women in the United States every year. Worldwide, the annual tally of new cases reaches more than half a million. The biggest advance against the disease in recent years has come in the area of prevention. Vaccination against the human papilloma virus (HPV) – two … Read more
When Roy Jann was diagnosed with cancer in 2013, it never crossed his mind that he would be a model for the life-saving potential of venetoclax, a new type of cancer drug that had recently entered human testing. The first inkling that something was amiss had come a few weeks earlier, while Jann was biking … Read more
This post originally appeared on WBUR’s CommonHealth blog. By Barrett Rollins, MD, PhD President Obama’s call for a new national effort against cancer – a “moon shot” – comes at a most opportune time. Cancer research has advanced significantly and now genomic analysis of individuals’ tumors can reveal the specific DNA changes that drive cancer … Read more
What is a mammogram? A mammogram is the most effective test for detecting breast cancer. It is a special X-ray of the breast that can reveal tumors that are often too small to be felt or noticed on a physical examination. It can also show other changes in the breast that doctors believe may suggest … Read more
Prostate cancer is the most common cancer affecting men in the United States, after skin cancer. Yet, “most men die with prostate cancer, not of prostate cancer,” says Mark Pomerantz, MD, a medical oncologist in Dana-Farber’s Lank Center for Genitourinary Oncology, who recently shared the latest in prostate cancer research and treatment during a live … Read more
Former President Jimmy Carter’s announcement earlier this week that he is free of the melanoma that had spread to his liver and brain may be the highest-profile example yet of the promise of a new form of cancer treatment that unleashes an immune system attack on the disease. Carter, 91, was treated with radiation therapy … Read more
Updated April 13, 2015 Venetoclax, a new type of cancer drug known as a Bcl-2 inhibitor, is showing great promise against a poor-prognosis form of chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL), and could work in other cancers as well. Venetoclax, formerly known as ABT-199, attacks the protein molecule, Bcl-2, that allows cancer cells to survive despite signals … Read more
The year 2015 marked a milestone in the treatment of lung cancer, with two new immunotherapy drugs approved for patients with advanced disease, bringing a new approach to this hard-to-treat cancer. Several other immunotherapy agents are also moving forward in clinical trials. In the past few years, scientists have found ways to disable the molecular … Read more
The FDA announced today it has approved a new pill to treat certain patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). The oral medication, Tagrisso (osimertinib), has been approved for NSCLC patients whose tumors have a specific epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) mutation (T790M) and whose disease has worsened after treatment with other EGFR-blocking therapy. … Read more