CybeKknife System/BMA/Memory Loss

[Guest guest]

September 10,2010

" The first CyberKnife VSI System to be installed in Europe was placed at the

Leon-Berard Cancer Multidisciplinary Center (CLB) in Lyon, France. The

CyberKnife VSI System is the newest addition to the CyberKnife product family.

One of France's leading cancer treatment facilities, the Leon-Berard Cancer

Center, is a non-profit hospital dedicated to cancer treatment and research

located in the Rhone-Alpes, the second largest region in France . The addition

of the CyberKnife System to the already well-equipped Radiation Oncology

department, which features five treatment accelerators, one dedicated scanner

and one brachytherapy suite, will expand the range of therapeutic options

available to the center's 2,000 yearly cancer patients.

" We feel strongly that the CyberKnife VSI System will help us deliver not only

more typical radiation therapy, but also allow us to treat cancer patients that

would otherwise have no other options, " said Christian , M.D., head of the

Radiation Oncology department at CLB. " Although the CyberKnife VSI System has

the capacity to deliver conventional fractionation, the main reason we chose

this system is for its superior accuracy and efficiency in the treatment of

moving targets, in particularly liver and prostate. "

With the CyberKnife VSI System, clinicians at Leon-Berard will now be able to

broaden delivery of high precision radiation therapy and radiosurgery for

extracranial indications. This new expertise will increase the range of

radiation treatments available at the Leon-Berard Cancer Center, which already

include respiratory gating radiation therapy, extracranial stereotactic

radiation therapy, interstitial brachytherapy, intensity modulated conformal

radiotherapy (IMRT), and total body irradiation (TBI). " We are very proud to

work with such a prestigious and highly scientific cancer center and announce

that patients will soon have access to CyberKnife VSI treatments, " said

Guillaume Tetard, Senior Director of Sales, Accuray EIMEA (Europe India Middle

East and Africa). " Given the increase in cancer diagnosis in France, now more

than ever it is crucial that patients have access to the latest technologies in

oncology care. We are confident that as acceptance of the CyberKnife System

grows, it will improve cancer care throughout Europe by bringing more

therapeutic options to doctors and patients. "

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/199707.php

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06 Oct 2010 -

" As the song says, a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, and now

researchers at s Hopkins have found that the sights and sounds of chirping

birds, ribbiting frogs and water trickling downstream can ease the substantial

pain of bone marrow extraction in one of five people who must endure it.

" In a report published in the September edition of the Journal of Complementary

and Alternative Medicine, the s Hopkins team also found that busy cityscapes

and sounds of honking cars in traffic, or the absence of other distractions

offered no significant relief from the pain experienced by cancer patients

undergoing bone marrow aspiration.And they found that even the soothing

distractions of the natural world only worked when the clinician performing the

complex procedure was highly skilled in minimizing pain.

" Bone marrow aspirations -- in which a six-inch long needle, one-eighth an inch

wide, is inserted into the base of the spine for as long as 10 minutes -- are

often needed repeatedly to diagnosis and monitor anemia and leukemia, and as

part of bone marrow transplant therapy. The researchers say an estimated 40

percent of cancer patients rank bone marrow aspiration pain as moderate to

severe. Study lead investigator, pulmonologist and critical care expert Noah

Lechtzin, M.D., M.H.S., says scenes from the natural world painted on bed

curtains, along with audio-taped sounds of outdoor life, are fairly simple

distractions that offer a safe, inexpensive way to reduce the serious discomfort

felt by patients for what is a widely practiced, life-saving procedure. " More at

website.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/203588.php

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04 Oct 2010

" Imagine the day a machine can draw your blood, screen it for genetic mutations

and chemical variations that can cause cancer, and pop out a drug tailor-made

for your DNA. That hypothetical drug would target - and fix - the point

irregularities which have accumulated over time that can lead to the formation

of tumors - and cancer. The National Institutes of Health has tapped Viterbi

professor Armani to develop a key instrument that takes researchers a

step closer to realizing this vision.

" Personalized cancer drug delivery? Depending on the approach, it could be as

soon as 10 to 15 years away, " says Armani, an assistant professor of the Mork

Family Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science. Armani has

received the NIH's 2010 New Innovator Award, which recognizes a select group of

researchers with " exceptional creativity " and bold approaches that " have the

potential to produce a major impact on broad, important problems in biomedical

and behavioral research. " The award amounts to a $2.3 million research grant

over five years to investigate epigenetics. This field studies changes in DNA

which are associated with cancer. (More at website )

Source: Mankin (University of Southern California)

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/203225.php

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October 2, 2010

" People with a history of cancer have a 40 percent greater likelihood of

experiencing memory problems that interfere with daily functioning, compared

with those who have not had cancer, according to results of a new, large study.

The findings, believed to be one of the first culled from a nationwide sample of

people diagnosed with different cancers, mirror findings of cancer-related

memory impairment in smaller studies of certain cancers, such as breast and

prostate cancer. Results were presented at the Third AACR Conference on The

Science of Cancer Health Disparities. " The findings show that memory impairment

in cancer patients is a national problem that we must pay special attention to, "

said Pascal Jean-Pierre, Ph.D., M.P.H., assistant professor at the University of

Miami School of Medicine, department of pediatrics, and the Sylvester

Comprehensive Cancer Center. " (More at website.)

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/203279.php

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October 2, 2010

" Virginia Commonwealth University Massey Cancer Center researcher Grant,

M.D., and a team of VCU Massey researchers have uncovered the mechanism by which

leukemia cells trigger a protective response when exposed to a class of

cancer-killing agents known as histone deacetylase inhibitors (HDACIs). The

findings, published in the Journal of Biological Chemistry, could lead to more

effective treatments in patients with leukemia and other cancers of the blood.

" Our findings provide new insights into the ways such cancer cells develop

resistance to and survive treatment, " says Grant, associate director for

translational research and professor of medicine. " This knowledge will now allow

us to focus our efforts on strategies designed to prevent these self-protective

responses, potentially rendering the cancer cell incapable of defense and

increasing the effectiveness of therapy. " (More at website.)

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/203115.php

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October 1, 2010

" Drug manufacturers have been adjusting to strict new government standards that

limit the amount of potentially harmful impurities in medicine, according to the

cover story of the current issue of Chemical & Engineering News (C & EN), ACS'

weekly newsmagazine. The impurities are " genotoxic, " capable of damaging the DNA

in genes.

" C & EN Senior Correspondent Ann Thayer notes that internationally accepted

regulations long have limited the levels of impurities permitted in prescription

drugs. But guidelines have not covered so-called genotoxic impurities (GTIs),

substances that can potentially increase the risk of cancer. That changed in

2007, after European regulators put guidelines in place and the U.S. Food and

Drug Administration soon after followed suit. The challenging new limits for

GTIs are about 1,000 times lower than the levels allowed for most other

impurities. Drug companies are complying with the guidelines, some regard the

limits as too strict, the article notes. Some industry scientists also question

the approaches proposed to categorize and test for GTIs. Nevertheless, drug

companies are working to change or control their manufacturing methods so that

GTIs either do not form in the first place or form at much lower levels.

Article: " Genotoxic Impurities " Source: Bernstein

American Chemical Society

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/203058.php

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FYI,

Lottie Duthu