Chemotherapy

Mixed response

Traditionally, the field of oncology was interested in complete partial response and progression. Later stable disease came into use, a measure of chemotherapy success that combined tumor shrinkage and cases in which there had been no change. Any growth , usually greater than a 25% increase in tumor size was called progression. Mixed response refers to a situation in which some metastases are responding and others are growing and/or new metastases

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Chemotherapy causes acid reflux

Acid reflux is a not unknown side effect of chemotherapy. Chemotherapy aslo worsens symptoms in patients with pre-existing gastrointestinal reflux disorder(GERD), especially in esophageal cancer, where multiple local factors exacerbate it. Unfortunately, reflux had not been rigorously studied but a variety of medications are known to alleviate this side effect. Proton pump inhibitors(PPI) are useful in this condition. It stands to reason that therapy

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Tykerb for stomach cancer

Stomach cancer is known to have amplification of the ErbB2 (HER2) gene and responds to the drug Herceptin, which used this pathwayto attach cacner cells . Recently, there has been an interest in using Tyker(lapatinib) which is a drug that utalizes the same mechanism of action as Herceptin. One such trial is: LOGiC - Lapatinib Optimization Study in ErbB2 (HER2) Positive Gastric Cancer: A Phase III Global, Blinded Study Designed to Evaluate Clinical

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Incomplete response to induction in acute myelogenous leukemia and salvage approaches

Standard Therapy of acute myelogenous leukemia (excluding acute promyelocytic leukemia) begins with induction chemotherapy and is followed by consolidation and sometimes by maintenance phases of treatment. Various acceptable induction regimens are available. The most common approach is called ”3 and 7,” which consists of 3 days of a 15- to 30-minute infusion of an anthracycline (idarubicin or daunorubicin) or anthracenedione (mitoxantrone), combined

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Erbitux for squamous cell cancer of unknown primary site

About 5% of all metastatic cancers come from the primary in an organ that cannot be securely identified. This may make assigning therapy difficult. The histology of the location may or may not give sufficient clues to where the cancer rose. The usually recommended approach is to use various stains to try to pinpoint the area of origin and then treat for that type of cancer. However, this is not always possible. When the primary site is not identified

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Rituxan and Rituxan with Gemcitabine for Hodgkin’s Disease

Until recently rituximab, or Rituxan has been thought of as a drug for Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Rituxan® is a monoclonal antibody approved for treatment of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma (NHL) and binds to a lymphoma surface molecule called CD 20. A small subset of patients with Hodgkin’s lymphoma (3% to 8%) has a type of cancer called CD 20 lymphocyte predominant Hodgkin’s lymphoma, characterized by a large proportion of their cancer cells expressing

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Non-gonadal Germinomas

Germinoma is primarily a disease of young males. There are germinomas that arise in the testicles or ovaries, the gonads, and those that do not. It is presumed that the non-testicular germinoma have their origin in germ cells left behind in various places in the body during the development of the fetus. The current World Health Organization classification of Germ Cell Tumors (GCT), which is based primarily on histological elements, divides these

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Second line chemotherapy for endometrial cancer

There is not much information on what to do after failure of first line chemotherapy in endometrial cancer. Currently, the standard of care for initial treatment of women who present with locally advanced disease or metastatic disease is anthracycline, taxane, and platinum combination. This is based on the Gynecologic Oncology Group (GOG) trial 177, which established the effectiveness of first-line paclitaxel, doxorubicin, and cisplatin (TAP) compared

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