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2024 FEB 17 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Obesity, Fitness & Wellness Week -- Research findings on cancer are discussed in a new report. According to [...]

2023 OCT 14 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Obesity, Fitness & Wellness Week -- Current study results on leukemia have been published. According to news reporting [...]

2023 JUL 1 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Obesity, Fitness & Wellness Week -- Investigators publish new report on acute myeloid leukemia. According to news reporting [...]

2022 SEP 17 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Obesity, Fitness & Wellness Week -- Fresh data on Oncology - Acute Myeloid Leukemia are presented in a [...]

2020 FEB 29 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Obesity, Fitness & Wellness Week -- Current study results on Oncology - Acute Myeloid Leukemia have been published. [...]

2019 APR 6 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Obesity, Fitness & Wellness Week -- Investigators discuss new findings in Oncology - Acute Myeloid Leukemia. According to [...]

Background. Given the good penetration of systemic high-dose cytarabine (HDara-C) into the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), this approach was used to treat patients with central nervous system (CNS) leukemia, either isolated or with concurrent extraneurologic disease (END). Methods. From 1983 to 1991, 46 adults with CNS involvement were treated with systemic HDara-C: 25 had acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), 15 had high-grade non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL), 5 had acute myelogenous leukemia (AML), and 1 had lymphoid blast crisis of chronic myelogenous leukemia. Induction consisted of HDara-C 3 g/[m.sup.2] every 12 hours, by 3-hour infusion, for 8 doses (30 patients), or 6 doses (16 patients), followed by 4 doses at day 21. Results. Of 46 patients, 29 (63%) achieved complete remission (CR): 15/15 with isolated CNS leukemia, and 14/31 (45%) with CNS and concurrent marrow or lymph node disease. Of 17 patients not meeting CR criteria because of persistent END, 11 showed complete CNS response. The first 10 remitters were consolidated with monthly 4-dose courses of HDara-C. The remaining 19 received postinduction multidrug chemotherapy (including vincristine, doxorubicin, cyclophosphamide, Lasparaginase, etoposide plus intermediate-dose ara-C, mitoxantrone plus HDara-C) and intrathecal methotrexate (MTX) [+ or -] cranial radiation therapy. One patient underwent autologous and one allogeneic bone marrow transplant. Median CR duration was 7 months (range, 2-56+): 8 months for patients with isolated CNS leukemia, and 4 months for those with concurrent END. In only two patients was CNS the primary site of relapse. Three patients with isolated CNS leukemia are disease-free at 23, 40, and 56 months. The main toxicity was myelosuppression. No patient showed dose-limiting neurologic toxicity. Conclusions. Systemic HDara-C appears effective therapy for CNS leukemia, maximally in cases with isolated CNS involvement. HDara-C may be combined safely with cranial radiation therapy and intrathecal MTX. This approach for CNS leukemia, however, needs to be combined with additional treatments to eradicate residual disease in extraneurologic compartments.

Chemotherapy is most often an empirical enterprise (based on observation), and the current protocols are a result of constant modification to improve effectiveness. Therefore, even the more successful protocols must be viewed as the new starting point from which further improvements may be made in treating cancers. Among children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), five-year event-free survival rates of 70 percent may be achieved with the better chemotherapeutic protocols. Anxious to increase the success of the present protocols, researchers have investigated the addition of methotrexate and cytosine arabinoside to the standard chemotherapeutic regimen for ALL. This is based on evidence that methotrexate and cytosine arabinoside act synergistically with one another (they are more effective when combined than when either is administered alone). However, there is also evidence that the exact schedule of administering these two drugs is critical for success. Prior to devising a full-scale clinical trial, researchers conducted a pilot study involving 106 children with non-T, non-B acute lymphoblastic leukemia. All children received a conventional regimen of chemotherapy, the 'backbone treatment', based on vincristine, prednisone, and L-asparaginase. As is customary, methotrexate and cytosine arabinoside were injected into the cerebrospinal fluid to prevent leukemia recurrence within the central nervous system. After four weeks, the patients who achieved complete responses were placed into one of two experimental groups. Forty-five high-risk patients were placed in the so-called 'up-front' group, in which intermediate-dose methotrexate and cytosine arabinoside were given every three weeks for six cycles. Fifty-four patients deemed standard-risk were given the two drugs on a 'spread-out' schedule of every 12 weeks for 6 cycles. The Kaplan-Meier estimates of four-year event-free survival were 71 percent for the standard-risk group and 53 percent for the high-risk group. These results support proceeding with a full-scale trial of these two drugs for continuation chemotherapy to improve the success of standard remission induction therapy in acute lymphoblastic leukemia. (Consumer Summary produced by Reliance Medical Information, Inc.)

In children and young adults, aggressive therapy is required in the treatment of acute nonlymphocytic leukemia. This usually means not only intensive induction therapy to induce remission in as many patients as possible, but also aggressive intensification therapy for the patients who do achieve remission. In a study of the timing of the intensification therapy in patients achieving remission, earlier aggressive intensification was demonstrated to be more effective. A total of 194 patients were treated for acute nonlymphocytic leukemia with two- to five-drug induction regimens, which are limited by bone marrow toxicity. One hundred thirty-four patients achieved remission; the 104 patients for whom bone marrow donors were not available and who were not lost to follow-up began intensification treatment with araC (cytarabine or cytosine arabinoside) either 7 or 28 days after induction. At 28 days, the blood is recovering from the induction chemotherapy, while at 7 days the blood counts are still dropping. After the araC intensification, patients were either placed on maintenance therapy or not, at the discretion of their individual physicians. Despite three treatment-related deaths in the seven-day group, that is, the ''aggressive'' treatment group, the three-year disease-free survival was 55 percent, compared with 42 percent for the 28-day group (the overall survival for the aggressive group was 64 percent). The decision on whether to provide maintenance therapy had no significant impact on survival among the patients receiving the aggressive araC treatment. However, among the patients on the more conservative 28-day araC intensification schedule, a three-year survival of 65 percent was observed in the group receiving maintenance therapy, in contrast with 39 percent in the group without maintenance. The results indicate that timing is an important aspect of intensification therapy, and that with aggressive intensification in the treatment of acute nonlymphocytic leukemia, maintenance therapy may provide no additional benefit. (Consumer Summary produced by Reliance Medical Information, Inc.)

Distinct patterns of nail changes following cancer chemotherapy has been described in literature. Drugs such as Adriamycin, Vincristine and Hydroxyurea as well as Cyclophosphamide can cause varying patterns of nail changes. We described a 20-year old black Nigerian who was diagnosed with Acute Myeloblastic Leukaemia (FAB, AMML-M4) and treated with 28 days cycle of intravenous infusion of Doxorubicin 45mg/[m.sup.2] days 1, 2 & 3, Cytosine arabinoside 100mg/[m.sup.2] days 1 to 7 and twice weekly intrathecal CNS prophylaxis with 12.5mg Methotrexate. By the 5th day of re-induction chemotherapy he progressively developed transverse brown-black banding and ridging with alternating transverse white banding on all the nails of both hands. These nail changes progressively disappeared after cessation of both drugs due to financial constraints. This report is the first of its kind in this part of the continent and will help to sensitize Haemato-Oncologist and clinicians administering cancer chemotherapy in resource poor settings like ours to be aware of these nail changes and to avoid elaborate diagnostic investigation to unravel the cause., Introduction Distinct patterns of nail changes following cancer chemotherapy has been described in literature (1,2,3,4). Drugs such as Adriamycin, Vincristine and Hydroxyurea as well as Cyclophosphamide and 5-fluorouracil can cause [...]

Vosaroxin (Sunesis) for the potential treatment of relapsed or refractory acute myeioid leukemia in combination with [...]