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When leukemia moves in, it makes itself right at home
Cancer cells will do whatever it takes to stay alive, and a City of Hope research team has discovered the sneaky way some leukemia cells can cause cancer after treatment. In this video, Ravi Bhatia, M.D., describes how cancer stem cells that cause chronic myelogenous leukemia, or CML, hide out in bone marrow and change their environment to protect themselves.
Bhatia, who directs the Division of Hematopoietic Stem Cell and Leukemia Research, and his colleagues published their study in the April 16 issue of the journal Cancer Cell.
Cancer cells can change the area around them to make conditions better for cancer to grow. In the case of a pancreatic tumor, for example, cancer cells can hide the tumor away from the immune system or encourage the pancreas to grow new blood vessels to feed the tumor. Cancer cells can change the immediate area surrounding the tumor — what scientists call the microenvironment — to help the tumor out.
Leukemia affects the bone marrow microenvironment in a similar way. It turns the area into a space that’s friendlier to leukemia cells. Even if powerful modern medicines successfully kill mature leukemia cells, leukemia stem cells can hide away in the bone marrow, manipulate it and emerge to cause CML again if patients stop taking the drugs.
Researchers think the information may lead to new strategies to counter CML. If scientists can better understand how the disease makes these long-term changes to the microenvironment, they may be able to find better treatments that can wipe out all leukemia cells and prevent them from returning. His team is continuing its investigations.
Researchers tackle cancer stem cells to counter triple-negative breast cancer
Nearly one out of five breast cancer patients has triple-negative breast cancer — an aggressive type of tumor that often returns despite treatment. This cancer can defy conventional therapy, and breast cancer stem cells may be to blame, explains City of Hope’s George Somlo, M.D., F.A.C.P. in this video.
Somlo, co-director of City of Hope’s Breast Cancer Program, says that successful, modern therapies like Herceptin target receptors found on the surface of most breast cancer cells. But triple-negative breast cancers have none of those receptors. They can resist other drug treatments, too, because their cells appear to act like cancer stem cells. Cancer stem cells can survive chemotherapy and radiation and then spread to other parts of the body.
But Somlo has joined with researchers at Stanford University to go after these stem cells. With major funding from the National Institutes of Health, the scientists are looking at triple-negative breast cancers in different ethnic groups and studying the characteristics of these cells. By understanding how the cells are different from other cancer cells and healthy breast cells, they hope to find pathways that are critical to the cells’ survival. Once they find those pathways, they can test drugs to block them.
Interested in learning more about the future of treatment for triple-negative breast cancer? Medical oncologist Thehang Luu, M.D., recently answered a few questions in City of Hope’s eHope newsletter about treatment directions for triple-negative breast cancer. For more about breast cancer clinical trials at City of Hope, visit Clinical Trials On-Line and select breast cancer from the menu.
City of Hope surgeon Laura Crocitto, M.D., talks about vitamin E and prostate cancer
You may have heard talk on the news about a link between vitamins and prostate cancer. A new study in the Journal of the American Medical Association reveals that men should be more aware of the vitamins and supplements they may be taking.
The SELECT study enrolled more than 35,000 healthy men across the country and found that those taking high doses of vitamin E over a seven-year period had about a 17 percent greater risk of prostate cancer compared to men taking a placebo.
Laura Crocitto, M.D., clinical associate professor of surgery in City of Hope’s Division of Urology and Urologic Cancer, gives a summary of the trial on video and lets men know what they should take away from the results. You can also learn more in interviews she gave to the Wall Street Journal (subscription may be required) as well as ABC7 Eyewitness News.
Confused about breast self-exams and cancer prevention? Learn more on video
The profusion of pink products, advertisements and inspiring survivor stories this time of year all serve to remind the public that October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Yet, many people need no such reminders because they live with the disease every day.
This year, doctors will diagnose about 230,480 new cases of invasive breast cancer, including 2,140 new cases in men, according to the American Cancer Society.
Detecting breast cancer early is the best way to beat the disease, and City of Hope surgeon Laura Kruper, M.D., wants to give you the tools to find tumors when they’re highly curable. In this video, Kruper, director of the Rita Cooper Finkel and J. William Finkel Women’s Health Center and head of City of Hope’s Breast Surgery Service, talks about risk factors, common misconceptions and warning signs of breast cancer — and shows how to perform a self-breast exam and offers practical tips.
