Future Science Group today announced that it will provide free access to three of its peer-reviewed, cancer-focused journals for the remainder of 2015. The journals, Hepatic Oncology, Melanoma Management, and the International Journal of Endocrine Oncology present the latest findings in their area of research and treatment, together with authoritative reviews, cutting-edge editorials and perspectives that highlight hot topics and controversy in the field.

"Given the critical importance of emerging research to every practitioner treating patients with cancer, we are very pleased to provide individuals with better access to new sources of quality information," said Phil Garner, Managing Director of Future Science Group. "While the journals are relatively new, each offers in depth coverage of an area of cancer that demands more attention and resources."

Hepatic Oncology publishes original research studies and reviews addressing preventive, diagnostic and therapeutic approaches to all types of cancer of the liver, in both the adult and pediatric populations. The quarterly journal also highlights significant advances in basic and translational research, and places them in context for future therapy.

For more details please see: http://www.futuremedicine.com/loi/hep

Melanoma Management launched in August 2014 and focuses on the clinical aspects of melanoma, from prevention to diagnosis and from treatment of early-stage disease to late-stage melanoma and metastasis. Published quarterly, Melanoma Management delivers an accessible overview of current and future melanoma management options in a concise format that is ideal for the busy clinician. The journal welcomes the unsolicited submission of article proposals and original research manuscripts.

For more details please see: http://www.futuremedicine.com/loi/mmt

International Journal of Endocrine Oncology is a quarterly, peer-reviewed journal that helps the clinician to keep up to date with best practice in a fast-moving field that covers a broad range of diseases, both malignant and benign. It presents research findings in diagnosis and management of endocrine cancer, including tumors of hormone-secreting glands, such as the pituitary, thyroid, pancreatic and adrenal glands, along with neuroendocrine tumors. Independent drug evaluations assess newly approved medications and their role in clinical practice.

For more details please see: http://www.futuremedicine.com/loi/ije

All of the journals welcome the unsolicited submission of article proposals and original research manuscripts. Select content can be accessed from the whole of Future Science Group's Oncology collection. Plus, via Oncology Central, Future Science Group's free eCommunity for oncology professionals, users can access breaking news, articles and other essential current information, all aimed and selected by fellow trusted clinicians.

First-in-human clinical trial using adenovirus to receive endorsement from both US Food and Drug Administration and Health Sciences Authority

The National Cancer Centre Singapore (NCCS) has launched a clinical trial of a new cancer vaccine administered to human patients for the first time in the world. Cancer immunotherapy (the harnessing of the body's defence system to fight the patient's cancer, has emerged as one of the most exciting medical breakthroughs in the past two years.

In fact, the prestigious Science journal voted Cancer Immunotherapy the Breakthrough of the Year for 2013. Cancer Immunotherapy includes cancer vaccines, a form of treatment aimed at stimulating the body's immune cells to attack a target protein on cancer cells. This particular cancer vaccine encodes one of the most common proteins, MUC-1 that is expressed on many cancers, including ovarian, breast, prostate, colon, pancreas and lung cancer, but not expressed on normal cells.

The Singapore Clinical Research Institute (SCRI), a wholly-owned subsidiary of MOH Holdings, sponsored this clinical trial providing support that included project oversight, study drug importation, quality assurance and providing the medical expertise required in conducting a cancer trial.

Dr Toh Han Chong, NCCS Principal Investigator of the phase I clinical trial, who is also a Senior Consultant in the Division of Medical Oncology, said, "What makes this vaccine unique is that MUC-1 is attached to a protein that is intentionally designed to further enhance and boost the efficiency and power of the body's immune system." This protein is called CD40-ligand (CD40L), to form a construct called MUC-1+CD40L.

This construct fits into the backbone of a hardy virus called adenovirus, which further improves the body's immune system specifically against MUC-1 expressed on the surface of the cancer, as demonstrated in convincingly superior animal study results. This vaccine has been developed by a United States biotech company, MicroVAX, and is injected under the patient's skin. The Singapore Clinical Research Institute (SCRI) is the sponsor for this clinical study.

Elsevier, a world-leading provider of scientific, technical and medical information products and services, today announced the publication of a position statement by the European Menopause and Andropause Society (EMAS) in the journal Maturitas on the topic of breast cancer screening.

Breast cancer is the most prevalent cancer in women, with slightly more than ten percent developing the disease in Western countries. Mammography screening is a well-established method to detect breast cancer. However there are concerns about over diagnosis with population-based screening programmes. Some tumors grow so slowly that they will not threaten the health of women during their lifetime. The women will die from another cause and thus it is argued that these tumors should not have been treated. Treatments can be invasive and painful, have major side-effects, especially in those with significant co-morbidities. While this is easy from an epidemiological standpoint, it is a dilemma for the treating physician dealing with individual women. It is virtually impossible to make the diagnosis of breast cancer and to predict the future behavior of that tumor. Thus individualization is proposed so that women may be categorized into 'low to moderate' and 'high' risk based on familial risk and the first screening mammogram so that further screening can be tailored.

Depypere et al., (2014). EMAS Position statement: Individualized breast cancer screening versus population-based mammography screening programmes. Maturitas, EPub Ahead of Print, DOI: 10.1016/j.maturitas.2014.09.002 [Article]

Being diagnosed with breast cancer is a life-changing experience. It can be hard to handle the news at first, and even harder to know how to proceed, no matter your prognosis.

While everyone’s journey is unique, knowing that others before you have been through something similar can give you the strength and inspiration you need to keep everything in perspective.

Click through slideshow for the type of wisdom gained from great personal struggle, and know that you’re not alone.

Written by Rachael Maier

- See more at: http://www.healthline.com/health/breast-cancer/quotes#sthash.BUA5itc4.dpuf

Long-term survival from pancreatic cancer has failed to improve in 40 years – with the outlook remaining the lowest of the 21 most common cancers, according to new figures published by Cancer Research UK. Today just over three per cent of pancreatic cancer patients survive for at least five years, only a fraction more than the two per cent who survived that long in the early 1970s.

Across all cancers, half of patients now survive at least twice that long. But most cases of pancreatic cancer go undetected until it is too late for surgery. And with the lack of effective tests and treatments for the disease, the majority of patients still die within a year.

But Cancer Research UK is planning to more than double its £6 million annual research spend on pancreas cancer within five years, making inroads into an area of research that until now has been globally neglected. The disease is now under the spotlight across the charity's five institutes nationwide.

Professor Andrew Biankin is among the three quarters of scientists at Cancer Research UK's Beatson Institute at the University of Glasgow who are contributing to pancreatic cancer research.

He said: "Pancreatic cancer has very few symptoms at first and I see far too many patients who, out of the blue, are told they may have just months or even weeks to live. We've been waiting too long for new drugs to treat the disease and there are very few options available for people with advanced forms of the disease. It's a situation that simply has to change and we can only do that by funding more high quality research and trials, to get treatments out of the lab and into patients as soon as possible."

Chemotherapy drugs are powerful enough to kill rapidly growing cancer cells, but they also can harm perfectly healthy cells, causing side effects throughout the body.

Cancer cells divide more quickly than healthy cells, and chemotherapy drugs effectively target those cells. Unfortunately, fast-growing cells that are healthy can be damaged too. There are many different chemotherapy drugs with the potential for many different side effects. These effects vary from person to person and from treatment to treatment.

Factors that play a role in side effects include other ongoing treatments, previous health issues, age, and lifestyle. Some patients experience few side effects while others feel quite ill. Although most side effects clear up shortly after treatment ends, some may continue well after chemotherapy has ended, and some may never go away.

Chemotherapy drugs are most likely to affect cells in the digestive tract, hair follicles, bone marrow, mouth, and reproductive system. However, cells in any part of the body may be damaged.

- See more at: http://www.healthline.com/health/cancer/effects-on-body#sthash.ZbSMeewY.dpuf

Cancer clinicians and a chaplain at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center have developed a tool to help doctors, nurses and other health care providers talk to dying patients and families who are, literally, praying for a miracle.

The AMEN (Affirm, Meet, Educate, No matter what) protocol, a script that can be used by medical staff, offers a way to negotiate these challenging conversations to affirm or acknowledge a patient's hope, share the patient's wish with others, continue to educate the patient and family about medical issues, and assure them that their health care team will remain with them throughout the duration of their care, "no matter what."

"The AMEN tool allows the provider to join the patient or family member as a fellow human being with hopes and aspirations, and fosters a sense of trust and commitment to care," said Rhonda S. Cooper, M. Div., B.C.C., the Cancer Center's chaplain.

In lectures at Johns Hopkins, she says, the tool has been presented to clinical staff as a way "to respect our patients' beliefs and values as we care for them to the best of our ability." Cooper and her colleagues described the conversational protocol online in the May 6 issue of the Journal of Oncology Practice.

According to Cooper, patients and their families often turn to the idea of a miracle during a serious illness or trauma. In a study cited by the researchers and conducted by the University of Connecticut and Georgetown University, 57 percent of adults randomly surveyed said they believed that "God's intervention could save a family member" even when physicians said that any further treatments would be futile.

Several chemotherapy patients at the UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center will be invited to use tablets with a unique social networking tool as part of their treatment plan. Researchers at the Betty Irene Moore School of Nursing at UC Davis hope to prove that mobile health technology improves the care experience for patients as well as the quality of care while also reducing cost.

The project is part of a two-year, $199,854 grant from the McKesson Foundation and its national Mobilizing for Health Initiative. Research on mobile health technology in cancer care is new, said Jill Joseph, the associate dean for research at the nursing school. Other cancer-related mobile applications are available, but are limited to education and awareness and don't provide disease management tools or real-time communication.

"We have ample evidence that cancer patients often receive fragmented care, experience significant distress, and may needlessly require care in emergency departments or inpatient settings, particularly during chemotherapy," Joseph said. "Little research and development has focused on providing novel technologies to support cancer care coordination."

Participating patients will use a tablet device, such as a Google Nexus or iPad, to connect to their unique and private Personal Health Network that includes a nurse coordinator — who manages the their care — along with family, caregivers, clinicians and other desired partners. These people can connect with one another through real-time messaging, video and audio components as well as schedule appointments, assign tasks, store and track information and more.

Clinical trial aims to identify why some breast cancer patients are at high risk for post-treatment fatigue

Although the prevalence and impact of cancer-related fatigue has been well established, very little is known about its predictors, mechanisms for development, and persistence post-treatment. A new research study at the Cedars-Sinai Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Institute, in partnership with UCLA, is aimed at identifying breast cancer patients most susceptible to post-treatment fatigue by measuring biological, behavioral and social risk factors.

"Understanding who is at risk for post-treatment fatigue, and why, is the first critical step in the development of personalized, targeted interventions for the treatment and prevention of breast cancer-related fatigue," said Arash Asher, MD, director of cancer rehabilitation and survivorship at the Cedars-Sinai Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Institute and the medical center's primary investigator on the study. "It is our hope to identify the biological and behavioral risk factors that contribute to a patient's overall risk for fatigue."

The research study aims to identify biological factors that may cause more severe fatigue in patients post-treatment. Among the biological markers studied, researchers will evaluate the role of inflammation as a key mechanism for cancer-related fatigue. Extensive research has shown a correlation between inflammatory markers in the blood and levels of fatigue among patients during and after breast cancer treatment.

The study also will examine psychological factors, including a history of depression and early-life stressors, that may increase risk for developing post-treatment fatigue in women with early-stage disease.

"By identifying women who are at risk for post-treatment fatigue, our multidisciplinary breast cancer team can work to develop targeted therapies to prevent or ameliorate this disabling symptom," said M. William Audeh, MD, MS, medical director of the Wasserman Breast Cancer Risk Reduction Program at the Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Institute breast cancer program. "By providing a deeper understanding of genetic and biological disease characteristics, as well as risk profiles, the study may also lead to highly personalized breast cancer treatments for each individual diagnosed."

Patients will be evaluated just after diagnosis and surgery and prior to the start of chemotherapy, radiation therapy and hormonal treatments. In this narrow window of time, patients will take part in physical and psychosocial evaluations that examine genetic, biological and psychosocial factors that may cause inflammation and worsen fatigue. Patients will be followed for 18 months after treatment completion and evaluated on a six-month basis.

This study, known as the RISE Study (Research on Inflammation, Stress and Energy Study), was created by principal investigator Julienne E. Bower, UCLA associate professor of Psychology and Psychiatry/Biobehavioral Sciences. The study is funded by the National Cancer Institute.

Patients interested in breast cancer or other clinical trials at Cedars-Sinai may visit http://cancertrialinfo.csmc.edu or contact Jaime Richardson, RN, clinical trial navigator at the Cedars-Sinai Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Institute, at 310-423-2133 or cancer.trial.info@cshs.org.