Cancer

Ambulatory cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy are at a substantial risk for venous thromboembolism (VTE) over the course of therapy and beyond it. Factors accounting for this risk include the activation of extrinsic and intrinsic coagulation pathways, platelet activation, impaired fibrinolysis, use of catheters, infusion of blood products, and thrombogenic potential of several chemotherapeutic drugs. A few stratification models can help identify patients at a higher risk of chemotherapy-associated VTE, who may benefit from preventive strategies...

Rational design and construction of fullerene derivatives play significant roles in the development of their applications for sensing, marking and imaging in the biomeidical fields. In the present work, a novel type of C60 fluorescent nanoparticles (C60 FNPs) were synthesized by the combination of thiol-ene chemistry and modification with folic acid (FA). The as-prepared C60 FNPs exhibited intense blue luminescence with a relatively high quantum yield (QY) of 26%, which is higher than any other reported fluorescent fullerene-based nanomaterials...

BACKGROUND: Polypharmacy and potentially inappropriate medications (PIMs) are prevalent in older adults with cancer, but their associations with physical function are not often studied. This study examined the associations of polypharmacy and PIMs with physical function in older adults with cancer, and determined the optimal cutoff value for the number of medications most strongly associated with physical functional impairment. METHODS: This cross-sectional analysis used baseline data from a randomized study enrolling patients aged ≥70 years with advanced cancer starting a new systemic cancer treatment...

The design, synthesis and identification of a novel series of Mannich bases of ciprofloxacin was reported. Naphthol derivatives 2a and 2b showed highly potent cytotoxic activity among the tested compounds. Compound 2a showed broad spectrum antiproliferative activity with GI50 of 2.5-6.79 µM with remarkable selectivity towards renal and prostate cancers with selectivity ratios ranging from 0.17 to 6.79. Independently, 2a showed outstanding activity against colon cancer HOP-92 cell lines with IC50 of 6.66 µM while 2b showed highly potent activity against ovarian cancer cell lines with IC50 of 0...

Discovering novel small molecules for cancer immunotherapy represents a promising but challenging strategy in future cancer treatment. Herein, we designed the first theranostic fluorescent probes to efficiently detect and inhibit the enzymatic activity of 2,3-dioxygenase 1 (IDO1). Probe 6b is a highly active IDO1 inhibitor (IC50  = 12 nM, Cellular IC50  = 10 nM), which can sensitively and specifically detect endogenous IDO1 in living cells. Furthermore, as a theranostic probe, 6b showed excellent in vivo antitumor efficacy in the CT26 xenograft mouse model as well...

Prostate cancer is the most common malignancy and leading cause of cancer deaths in men. Thus, the development of novel strategies for performing combined prostate cancer imaging and therapy methods is crucial and could have a significant impact on patient care. This current study aimed to design a multimodality nanoconjugate to be used for both PET and optical imaging and as a therapeutic radio/photo sensitizer and anti-angiogenesis agent. Initial characterization of this novel nanoconjugate was performed via HPLC, FTIR, TEM and DLS analyses...

BACKGROUND: Mean ADC has high predictive value for the presence of clinically significant prostate cancer (sPC). Measurement variability is introduced by different scanners, protocols, intra-and inter-patient variation. Internal calibration by ADC ratios can address such fluctuations however can potentially lower the biological value of quantitative ADC determination by being sensitive to deviations in reference tissue signal. PURPOSE: To better understand the predictive value of quantitative ADC measurements in comparison to internal reference ratios when measured in a single scanner, single protocol setup...

OBJECTIVE: To examine the impact of age and underlying comorbid conditions on swallowing in elderly patients with dysphagia. METHODS: Charts of consecutive patients aged >64 studied by Videofluoroscopic swallowing study (VFSS) between 2010 and 2018 at our institution were reviewed (n = 731). Patients were categorized based on age into young old (aged 65-74), older old (aged 75-84) and oldest old (aged 85+). The underlying comorbidities and VFSS results were compared between different age groups...

Antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs) hold great therapeutic promise for cancer indications; however, treating tumors with intratumor heterogeneity remains challenging. We hypothesized that ADCs that can simultaneously target two different cancer antigens could address this issue. Here, we report controlled production and evaluation of bispecific ADCs chemically functionalized with tumor-targeting small molecules. Enzyme-mediated conjugation of bi-functional branched linkers and following sequential orthogonal click reactions with payload and tumor targeting modules (folic acid or RGD peptide) afforded homogeneous bispecific ADCs with defined ligand/drug-to-antibody ratios ranging from 4 + 4 to 16 + 4 (ligand/payload)...

A forward genetic Sleeping Beauty (SB) insertional mutagenesis screen, followed by high-throughput transcriptome sequencing, was used to identify driver genes responsible for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC)-associated metastasis. Using RNA-sequencing (RNA-seq) to identify transposon-endogenous transcriptome fusion genes, the phylogenetic lineage between the parental liver tumor and secondary metastasis can be determined to provide mechanistic insight to genetic changes involved in the metastatic evolution process...

OBJECTIVES: While smoking is associated with worse outcomes in HPV-positive oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OPSCC), the magnitude of this association is unclear given the heterogenous smoking definitions and outcomes. Our objective was to investigate the association between smoking, survival, and recurrence in HPV-related OPSCC using multiple smoking metrics reported in the literature. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This was a retrospective cohort study of 375 adults with p16+ OPSCC undergoing surgical resection (n = 272) or definitive chemoradiation (n = 103) at a tertiary academic institution from 2006 to 2017...

PURPOSE: To investigate the potential for cancer cells to be transferred between anatomic sites via instruments and other materials. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Pilot prospective study from April 2018-January 2019 at Rush University Medical Center. Glove and instrument washings were collected from 18 high-risk head and neck cancer resection cases (36 samples total). Each case maintained at least one of the following features in addition to a diagnosis of squamous cell carcinoma or sarcoma: palliative/salvage surgery, positive margins, extensive tumor burden, and/or extra capsular extension (ECE)...

Cowden Syndrome (CS) is an autosomal dominant disorder characterized by hamartomatous growth in several organs and by an increased risk of malignancies, which makes its recognition essential to undertake risk reduction measures. Although the involvement of gastrointestinal tract is extremely common, awareness of this entity among gastroenterologists appears limited. We report on two unrelated patients: a 46-year-old male and a 38-year-old woman, who were referred to the Genetic Clinic because of the endoscopic finding of multiple colorectal polyps...

This study aimed to characterize PM2.5 -bound trace elements in Northern Zhejiang Province (NZP), one of the most economically prosperous regions in China, and assess the associated health risks for the general populations. A year-long sampling campaign was conducted at four sites representative of urban, suburban, and rural areas of NZP. The average of the sum of twenty trace elements in PM2.5 was 2.8 ± 0.4 μg m-3 , dominated by K, Al, Fe, Mg, Zn, and V (>100 ng m-3 ). The highest total elements' concentration occurred in winter, followed by autumn, spring, and summer...

β-transducin repeats-containing protein-1 (β-TrCP1) serves as the substrate recognition subunit for SCFβ-TrCP E3 ubiquitin ligases, which specifically ubiquitinate phosphorylated substrates. Three variants of β-TrCP1 are known and act as homodimer or heterodimer complexes. Here, we identified a novel full-sequenced variant, β-TrCP1-variant 4, which harbours exon II instead of exon III of variant 1, with no change in the open reading frame. The expression of β-TrCP1-variant 4 is lower than that of variant 1 or 2 in ovarian cancer cell lines, whereas it is abundantly expressed in normal and cancerous ovarian tissues...

CONTEXT: Although endometrial cancer is the fourth most common malignancy in women, dissemination to the brain is an exceptional event in the course of the disease. The aim of this review is to determine the important surgical prognostic factors for patients with endometrial cancer metastatic to the brain. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Report of two cases. Medline database was used to conduct a systematic literature review from inception to December 2020 looking for English-language articles focused on brain metastases from endometrial cancer...

INTRODUCTION: Management of breast cancer patients undergoing hemodialysis (HD) is difficult because of a lack of evidence about drug selection, dose adjustment, and surgical procedures. We herein present a case of metastatic breast cancer in a patient undergoing HD. PRESENTATION OF CASE: A 58-year-old Japanese woman with breast cancer undergoing HD underwent total mastectomy of the left breast and left axillary dissection. Histopathological examination revealed invasive ductal carcinoma, and the diagnosis was pT2N3cM0 Stage ⅢC...

INTRODUCTION AND IMPORTANCE: Many cases of unresectable cancer that cause obstructive jaundice require treatment. Depending on the patient's condition in these cases, surgery may be performed to treat jaundice. The main goal of palliative surgery is to improve the quality of life. Therefore, palliative surgery for obstructive jaundice must be performed safely and quickly. CASE PRESENTATION: This case presents a 45-year-old man with fever and back pain who was diagnosed with pancreatic head cancer and multiple liver metastases...

OBJECTIVE: Some hormonal and targeted treatment options are available in the first line of metastatic HR+ & HER2- breast cancer. This study aimed to quantify the preferences of Iranian breast cancer patients regarding the levels of attributes of hypothetical treatment options. METHODS: The discrete choice experiment included 16 orthogonally designed scenarios. A novel method (named "the World Cup") was used to offer the scenarios to the respondents...

In the WHO glioma classification guidelines grade (glioblastoma versus lower-grade glioma), IDH mutation and 1p/19q co-deletion status play a central role as they are important markers for prognosis and optimal therapy planning. Currently, diagnosis requires invasive surgical procedures. Therefore, we propose an automatic segmentation and classification pipeline based on routinely acquired pre-operative MRI (T1, T1 postcontrast, T2 and/or FLAIR). A 3D U-Net was designed for segmentation and trained on the BraTS 2019 training dataset...