immune system – Page 2 – Oral Cancer News

HPV Vaccine and Premarital-Sex Controversy

Source: The News Tribune Some perspective is needed on the controversy over the Human Papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine that arose after a recent Republican presidential debate. The best way to do that is to take sex out of the equation. Instead of preventing a sexually transmitted disease that can lead to cervical cancer in women and oral cancer in men, let’s say the HPV vaccine guarded against a fictional virus that caused breast cancer and prostate cancer. Wouldn’t most parents jump at the chance to decrease the chances of their children contracting those potentially deadly cancers? Only the most hard-core anti-vaccine holdout would say no. Which gets us back to the sex part of the HPV equation and why some otherwise rational people don’t think children should be inoculated against it. They oppose the HPV vaccine – Cervarix or Gardasil – because they fear that removing one of the consequences of premarital sex would encourage it. It’s a weak argument. The fear of STDs and pregnancy hasn’t put much of a damper on teens having sex, so it’s hard to see why the chance of developing cancer several years down the road would slow them down. They also know that smoking can cause lung cancer, but many still do it. Sometimes parents have to do things to protect kids from themselves – and teens from their hormones. Most young people will not wait until marriage to have sexual relations; parents who think not getting their children vaccinated against HPV will deter [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2011-09-27T10:32:53-07:00September, 2011|Oral Cancer News|

Sanford researcher to study new oral cancer therapy

Source: www.mdnews.com Author: public release A new Sanford clinical trial will study the safety and effectiveness of a drug treatment on patients receiving radiation and chemotherapy for head and neck cancer. About three to five percent of all cancers reported in the United States are head and neck cancers. Although the incidence of this type of cancer is relatively low, survival rates are poor — with about a 50 percent of patients surviving over the five-year period following diagnosis, according to John Lee, MD, FACS, Principal Investigator of the trial and a Sanford Clinic Ear, Nose and Throat specialist. Lee’s early research led to the discovery that mice treated with the generic drug dichloroacetate (DCA) responded to cancer therapy 30 percent better. He has received approval from the Food and Drug Administration to begin a clinical trial with patients who are receiving treatment for head and neck cancer. The trial will be open to Sanford patients, and others nationwide. “We are proud of and continue to encourage innovative clinical trials at Sanford that helps us further understand the molecular, cellular and genetic basis of cancer,” said David Pearce, PhD, Vice President, Sanford Research in Sioux Falls. Dr. Lee, who was honored in 2010 by the American Cancer Society for his research, has been studying the link between the Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) and the development of head and neck cancers. His research team has tested the treatment of head and neck tumors in mice finding that factors that enhanced the [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2011-07-16T11:48:35-07:00July, 2011|Oral Cancer News|

Immunity Drugs Used to Fight Cancer

Source: The Wall Street Journal Scientists are scrambling to develop medications that fight cancer by spurring the body's immune system, a form of treatment that some cancer specialists believe may hold the key to keeping a patient permanently disease-free. The new efforts come in the wake of recent Food and Drug Administration approvals of Dendreon Corp.'s Provenge, an immunotherapy drug used to treat prostate cancer, and Bristol-Myers Squibb Co.'s Yervoy, for melanoma. Other immunotherapy drugs are being developed for a number of other cancers, including lung, brain and kidney cancers. Unlike most traditional therapies that attack a cancer directly, immunotherapy uses the body's own internal defenses to ward off the disease, with the ultimate hope of building up a long-term resistance to the cancer. "If we are ever going to use the word 'cure', the immune system is going to have to come into play," says Stephen Hodi, director of the melanoma center at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. One of the ways that cancer survives and ultimately spreads through the body is by exploiting a function in all cells that prevents the immune system from killing them. Researchers have found that cancer cells have multiple methods of avoiding detection and suppressing the immune system's response. "Why would cancer devote so much energy to avoid the immune system if the immune system didn't have the potential to reject the cancer?" says Robert Vonderheide from the Abramson Cancer Center of the University of Pennsylvania. There are big hurdles to advancing the [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2011-06-14T10:26:14-07:00June, 2011|Oral Cancer News|

SciClone identifies unique genetic markers associated with patient response to SCV-07 treatment in oral mucositis

Source: www.marketwatch.com Author: press release SciClone Pharmaceuticals, Inc. today announced that researchers have identified two unique gene clusters that differentiated subjects who responded to treatment in the Company's phase 2a proof of concept study of SCV-07 for the prevention of severe oral mucositis (OM; WHO grades 3-4) in patients with advanced head and neck cancer. The Company believes that the discovery of these gene clusters may assist in providing the framework for effectively identifying those patients most likely to respond to SCV-07 in future clinical trials based on their individual genomic profile or gene signature. These findings were presented today in a poster presentation at the 4th American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) International Conference on Molecular Diagnostics in Cancer Therapeutic Development. As part of the Company's recently completed phase 2a OM study, researchers collected and analyzed RNA samples from patients prior to and at the completion of the trial's treatment phase. Results from this gene expression analysis demonstrated the strong association of two specific gene clusters with patient response to SCV-07. Consistent with SCV-07's activity as a modulator of the immune system, these clusters included genes associated with G-protein coupled receptors, signal transducers, glycoproteins and membrane proteins. "The identification of these specific genetic markers represents an exciting and potentially powerful development in the clinical advancement of SCV-07 for the treatment of oral mucositis," said Dr. Stephen T. Sonis, speaking in his role as Chief Medical Officer of Biomodels, LLC. Dr. Sonis is also a Clinical Professor of Oral Medicine [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2010-09-30T12:56:10-07:00September, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

SciClone announces topline results from Phase 2 clinical trial of SCV-07 for prevention of oral mucositis

Source: CNNMoney.com Author: press release SciClone Pharmaceuticals, Inc. today announced topline results from the company's phase 2 clinical trial of SCV-07 for the prevention of severe oral mucositis (OM) (World Health Organization, WHO scale, grades 3 to 4) -- a painful, debilitating, and costly toxicity caused by chemoradiotherapy regimens used to treat head and neck cancer. This proof of concept study was intended to provide an estimate of SCV-07's treatment effect and guide further studies of SCV-07 in addressing this serious unmet medical need. Patients receiving the study's higher dose (0.1 mg/kg) of SCV-07 showed a trend towards delay to onset of severe OM, the study's primary endpoint. Patients in the low dose treatment arm (0.02 mg/kg) appeared to do worse than placebo, suggesting that the treatment effect is sensitive to dose. Additionally, SCV-07 was safe and well tolerated with no drug-related serious adverse events reported, indicating that there is potential to administer higher doses of SCV-07 in future clinical studies. Additional data analysis showed a more pronounced clinical benefit for patients in the high dose treatment arm when evaluating the delay to onset of ulcerative OM (WHO scale, grades 2 to 4), an expanded measure of OM. In this analysis, the low dose treatment arm appeared similar or slightly better than placebo. "We are encouraged that the trial provides an indication of a biological signal, in the high dose arm, for the pre-specified primary endpoint of the study," said Stephen T. Sonis, DMD, DMSc, Senior Physician, Brigham and Women's [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2010-04-01T19:51:55-07:00April, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

New uses for erectile disfunction drugs

Source: abclocal.go.com/wjrt Author: Leslie Toldo Could Viagra be the next cancer cure? HealthFirst reporter Leslie Toldo shows us why doctors think some impotence drugs may be as versatile as aspirin. E-D, or erectile dysfunction drugs, are being explored as treatments for more than a dozen diseases and health problems. They're the images of happy couples that helped make erectile dysfunction drugs a $3 billion business. But now doctors say those little pills may also save lives. "I did ask them what on earth they were talking about," said cancer patient Brian Kumnick. Kumnick is fighting throat cancer. He's been through months of radiation and surgery. "Well, the radiation, it's barbaric. It's really barbaric, and I've lost my taste buds, for example. I can't taste anything. Water tastes like acid going down." He's part of a clinical trial to see if the E-D drug Cialis can cure head and neck cancers. "It'd be really nice to just take a pill that has a pleasant side effect," Kumnick said. In preliminary studies, doctors at Johns Hopkins say Cialis energized patients' immune systems so their bodies could battle the cancer cells. Next, they'll test to see if the drug also shrinks tumors. Dr. Joseph Califano is a professor in the Department of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital. "When we looked at the blood of head and neck cancer patients, we could get their immune response to rev up to near normal levels, whereas they were suppressed maybe 75 percent, sometimes [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2010-02-18T22:26:38-07:00February, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

GenVec receives orphan drug designation

Source: www.onemedplace.com Author: staff GenVec’s experimental drug to treat pancreatic cancer has been granted orphan drug status by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The drug candidate TNFerade stimulates the production of an immune system protein known for having anti-cancer effects. Shares in GenVec rose 25 percent following the announcement. Last summer, Gaithersburg, Maryland-based GenVec announced positive data from a Phase II/III clinical trial of TNFerade. The drug provided a 42.5% reduction in the risk of death when combined with standard treatment, when compared to standard treatment alone. TNFerade is also being explored as a candidate to treat esophageal cancer, rectal cancer, and head and neck cancer. Note: The FDA grants orphan drug designation to drugs that may be significantly more effective than currently existing treatments, and target conditions that affect less than 200,000 U.S. patients per year. Upon approval, drugs granted orphan status enjoy seven years of marketing exclusivity in the United States.

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2009-11-08T12:07:30-07:00November, 2009|Oral Cancer News|

Brazil develops medicine effective for rebuilding immune system

Source: news.xinhuanet.com Author: Fang Yang A team of Brazilian researchers is developing a medicine to treat AIDS, tuberculosis and cancerous tumors, according to an article published on Sunday's edition of Science, a magazine of Brazil' State of Sao Paolo University (UNESP). The medicine, known as P-Mapa, has shown signs of rebuilding immune systems in tests on animals and humans in Brazil, Chile and the United States, scientists said. P-Mapa has shown to trigger production of anti-tumor or anti-viral molecules in immune system cells, according to both Brazil's Emilio Ribas Institute and the U.S. National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). "In all the tests performed to date, the drug has shown itself to be active and free of collateral or toxic side effects," said Iseu Nunes, director of Farmabrasilis, a non-government organization participating in the research. According to NIAID, the medicine is also effective in rats against Punta Toro, a virus which destroys their livers, outperforming traditional hepatitis C medicine. In addition, researchers are testing the medicine's effectiveness in fighting diabetes, osteoporosis and mouth cancer, with promising results. Researchers are expected to release the medicine and its profits will be invested in public health projects.

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2009-10-06T06:51:00-07:00October, 2009|Oral Cancer News|