Huntington’s disease Lowers Cancer Risk

People with Huntington’s disease, a debilitating brain condition, appear have a “protection” from cancer, according to a study in Sweden.

Nearly 40 years of medical records showed patients with Huntington’s had half the normal expected risk of developing tumours.

Researchers, writing in The Lancet Oncology, said the reason was unclear. Cancer Research UK said the findings presented another avenue to explore in tackling cancer.

Academics at Lund University analysed Swedish hospital data from 1969 to 2008. They found 1,510 patients with Huntington’s disease.

Huntington’s disease Lowers Cancer Risk

During the study period, 91 of those patients subsequently developed cancer. The authors said that was 53% lower than the levels expected for the general population.

Huntington’s is one of a group of illnesses called “polyglutamine diseases”. Data from other polyglutamine diseases also showed lower levels of cancer.

The authors said: “We found that the incidence of cancer was significantly lower among patients with polyglutamine diseases than in the general population.

“The mechanisms behind the protective effects against cancer are unclear and further research is warranted.”

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Dr Jianguang Ji, from the Center for Primary Health Care Research at Lund University, told the BBC: “Clarification of the mechanism underlying the link between polyglutamine diseases and cancer in the future could lead to the development of new treatment options for cancer.”

Eleanor Barrie, senior science information officer at Cancer Research UK, said: “These are interesting results. It’s not clear how the genetic changes that cause Huntington’s and other similar diseases could protect against cancer, and research in the lab will help to find out more.

“Scientists at Cancer Research UK and around the world are probing the genetic faults that contribute to cancer in their quest to beat the disease, and this is another potential avenue to explore.”

Source: BBC News UK

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Skin Cancer Drug Hopes Raised by Study

A new treatment for advanced skin cancer almost doubles survival times, according to an international study.

Doctors say 132 patients in the US and Australia who were given the drug vemurafenib gained several extra months of line. Research in the New England Journal of Medicine found those in the study lived an average of 16 months, compared with nine months on conventional treatment.

Vemurafenib (Zelboraf) has been recommended for approval in Europe. The treatment is one of two drugs for late-stage melanoma, approved on fast-track in the US last year, which offer hope for patients with advanced melanoma.

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Before that, there had been no new drugs for the cancer for more than a decade. Vemurafenib is suitable for about half of patients with advanced melanoma as it targets tumours that express a certain gene mutation.

Dr Antoni Ribas, a professor of haematology/oncology and a researcher at the Jonsson Cancer Center at the University of California-Los Angeles, said: “This study shows that Zelboraf changes the natural history of this disease. This data is beyond what I would have expected.

“We’re seeing a significant number of patients with durable responses to the drug, and that the whole group of treated patients is living longer.  These results tell us that this drug is having a very big impact, and this changes the way we treat metastatic melanoma.”

According to the European Medicines Agency, the drug has been recommended for approval in Europe, pending final authorisation by the European Commission.

Elizabeth Woolf, head of Cancer Research UK’s information website Cancer Help UK, said: “This is an interesting, impressive but relatively small trial of a promising new-generation melanoma drug, which Cancer Research UK is proud to have played a role in developing.”

But she said there were still questions that remain unanswered, not least the cost.  “Everyone on the trial had the drug, so we cannot tell how large the benefits are, compared to people who didn’t have it, or had another treatment. And because the drug targets a particular gene fault, only half of all melanoma patients are eligible. About half of those treated seem to benefit, so it could potentially help roughly a quarter of patients with advanced melanoma overall.  Looking at these uncertainties, and now that the drug is available to UK cancer patients, it will be interesting to see what price the manufacturer charges so as not to place too great a strain on already scarce NHS resources.”

Drug resistance

Cancer Research UK said once the drug was licensed in Europe, patients would be able to discuss treatment options with their doctor.

In England, patients will have to apply to the Cancer Drugs Fund, the charity said. Kate Law, director of clinical and population research at Cancer Research UK, said the treatment was one of a new generation of cancer drugs targeted at patients with a specific genetic make-up.

While it offered hope, she said, it was not a cure as the cancer eventually became resistant to the drug.

She told the BBC: “This is not a cure – you’re talking an extra six months of life. We’re getting somewhere with these targeted drugs but we have a whole raft of research still to do to address the issue of resistance.”

Source: BBC News UK

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Pancreatic Cancer: Trial Drug MRK003 Shows Promising Results

Scientists say they may have found a new weapon against pancreatic cancer after promising early trial results of an experimental drug combination.

Giving the chemotherapy agent gemcitabine with an experimental drug called MRK003 sets off a chain of events that ultimately kills cancer cells, studies in mice show. Patients are now testing the treatment to see if it will work for them.

The Cancer Research UK-funded trials are being carried out in Cambridge.  Father-of-two Richard Griffiths, 41, from Coventry, has been on the trial since being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in May 2011.

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He said “After six cycles of treatment, a scan showed the tumours had reduced and so I have continued with the treatment. The trial gives you hope – I really feel I can do this with the science behind me.”

Aggressive cancer

Cancer Research UK says it is prioritising research into pancreatic cancer because the survival rate still remains dismally low.

About 8,000 people in the UK are diagnosed with pancreatic cancer each year, and the disease is the fifth most common cause of cancer death in the UK.

Survival rates are very low in relation to other cancers, and the length of time between diagnosis and death is typically short, usually less than six months.

The most recent data for England show that about 16% of patients survive the disease beyond 12 months after diagnosis – prompting the need for new treatments.

Professor Duncan Jodrell, who is leading the trials at the University of Cambridge, said: “We’re delighted that the results of this important research are now being evaluated in a clinical trial, to test whether this might be a new treatment approach for patients with pancreatic cancer, although it will be some time before we’re able to say how successful this will be in patients.”

In total, about 60 patients with advanced pancreatic cancer will be recruited for the first Phase I/II clinical trial.

Source: BBC News UK

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