The right chance for temozolomide in metastatic colorectal cancer?

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Pathological assessment of resection specimens after neoadjuvant therapy for metastatic melanoma

Abstract

Background

Clinical trials have recently evaluated safety and efficacy of neoadjuvant therapy among patients with surgically resectable regional melanoma metastases. To capture informative prognostic data connected to pathological response in such trials, it is critical to standardize pathologic assessment and reporting of tumor response after this treatment.

Methods

The International Neoadjuvant Melanoma Consortium meetings in 2016 and 2017 assembled pathologists from academic centers to develop consensus guidelines for pathologic examination and reporting of surgical specimens from AJCC (8^th Edition) stage IIIB/C/D or oligometastatic stage IV melanoma patients treated with neoadjuvant targeted or immune therapy. Patterns of pathologic response provided context to inform these guidelines.

Results

Based on our collective experience and guided by efforts in well-established neoadjuvant settings like breast cancer, procedures directing handling of pre- and post-neoadjuvant therapy treated melanoma specimens are provided to facilitate comparison of findings across different trials and centers. Definitions of pathologic response are provided together with guidelines for reporting and quantifying the extent of pathologic response. Finally, the spectrum of histopathologic responses observed following neoadjuvant targeted and immune checkpoint therapy is described and illustrated.

Conclusions

Standardizing pathologic evaluation of resected melanoma metastases following neoadjuvant targeted or immune-checkpoint therapy allows more robust stratification of patient outcomes. This includes recognizing the spectrum of histopathologic response patterns to neoadjuvant therapy and a standard approach to grading pathologic responses. Such an approach will facilitate comparison of results across clinical trials and inform ongoing correlative studies into the mechanisms of response and resistance to agents applied in the neoadjuvant setting.

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The value of radical radiotherapy in the primary tumor of newly diagnosed oligo-metastatic nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients

Abstract

Background

To explore the efficacy and patterns of treatment failure of radical radiotherapy in newly diagnosed oligo-metastatic nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients.

Methods

We included 39 newly diagnosed oligo-metastatic nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients who received radical radiotherapy and chemotherapy in Zhejiang Cancer Hospital. Treatment and prognosis information were collected. The Kaplan–Meier methods and Cox proportional hazards models were used to calculate survival rates and analyze prognostic factors.

Results

After a median follow-up time of 38 months, the 1-, 3-, and 5-year overall survival rates were 97, 70, and 57.9%, while the 1-, 3-, and 5-year progression-free survival rates were 87, 59, and 50.9%, respectively. Age, numbers of metastases lesions, cycles, and schemes of chemotherapy were independent prognostic factors of the overall survival. Patients with no more than three metastasis lesions had a higher survival rate than those with ≥ 3 metastatic lesions (P = 0.023). More than four cycles chemotherapy provide a higher survival rate than less than four cycles. Chemotherapy including docetaxel had a significantly survival advantages (P = 0.041).

Conclusion

Radical radiotherapy is important for newly diagnosed oligo-metastatic nasopharyngeal carcinoma patients, which can still achieve long-term survival after chemo-radiotherapy.

https://ift.tt/2tsAWqW

Isolation and identification of specific bacteriophage against enteropathogenic Escherichia coli (EPEC) and in vitro and in vivo characterization of bacteriophage

Abstract

In recent years, the increasing resistance of enteropathogenic Escherichia coli (EPEC) to commonly used antibiotics has made it difficult to choose the best treatment option. Bacteriophage therapy could be a potent alternative to antibiotic therapy for antibiotic-resistant bacteria. The aim of the present study was to isolate and identify a specific bacteriophage against enteropathogenic E. coli (EPEC) and characterize bacteriophage in vitro and in vivo. The specific bacteriophage was isolated and the effect of phage therapy on 48 mice (Balb/c) was investigated. Animals were divided into six groups, including A: PBS (negative control), B: bacteria (positive control), C: bacteria + ciprofloxacin (after 24 hours), D: bacteria + bacteriophage (after 24 hours), E: bacteria + ciprofloxacin + bacteriophage (after 24 hours), and F: bacteriophage + bacteria (after 24 hours). Specific bacteriophage against EPEC was isolated from hospital sewage. The bacteriophage had an icosahedral head (120 nm) and a tail (138 nm). The single dose of the bacteriophage (2 × 10⁹ pfu ml⁻¹) was able to control the infection. Unfortunately, because of the misuse of antibiotics by EPEC infected patients, the antibiotic resistant bacteria will become prevalent in the future and the treatment of EPEC infection is going to become more difficult than ever.

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A new approach to study attached biofilms and floating communities from Pseudomonas aeruginosa strains of various origins reveals diverse effects of divalent ions

Abstract

Pseudomonas aeruginosa is an opportunistic pathogen associated with nosocomial infections and disease complications. In the lungs of cystic fibrosis (CF) individuals, biofilm growth plays a crucial role in the persistence and antibiotic resistance of P. aeruginosa. Some strains, adapted to the CF lung microenvironment, show distinguishable phenotypes linked to biofilm production when compared to other strains. Using a novel image analysis quantification approach with crystal violet-stained biofilms, we compared the biofilm formation of four different P. aeruginosa isolates in 24-well plates: PAO1, the reference strain, LESB58 from CF patients' lungs, and PPF-1 and Urg-7, two environmental isolates from dental unit waterlines. We also observed the formation of biofilm-like structures (BLSs) floating in the medium and investigated growth inhibition of the attached biofilm and BLS with Mg²⁺ or Zn²⁺. Urg-7 produced the most attached biofilms, but not the most BLSs. Attached biofilms had different responses to cations than BLSs did, but the effect of the cations was similar for all strains. These results demonstrate some diversity of biofilm formation in P. aeruginosa and indicate that chemical inhibition of attached biofilm formation for a specific strain or isolate cannot be predicative of a result on other P. aeruginosa strains or on BLSs.

https://ift.tt/2lxBqYs

Death of scientific journals after 350 years

Abstract

Scientific journals have virtually disappeared as subscription-based familiar paper copies. These have been replaced by article by article access on internet sites (either subscription based paid for by libraries in multi-journal often million dollar 'Big Deal' packages, or by author prepayments of thousand dollars 'article processing fees' (Omary and Lawrence 2017) followed by open access). The result appears to be the death of the traditional scientific journal as a familiar means of communication, after nearly 350 years from the time of Anton van Leeuwenhoek and Robert Hooke (for 2 early microbiology examples). Rather than journals with page numbers, individual reports are accessed using titles or manuscript file code numbers. This commentary is knowingly provocative, describing the rapidly-changing situation in scientific publication at the beginning of the 21st century and predicting a bad future, basically the end of the long-time most-used vehicles for scientific communication, the paper scientific journal with volumes and issues. This view is not particular to this author and appears frequently today (e.g. The Scientist 2012; https://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2016/10/26/revisiting-why-hasnt-scientific-publishing-been-disrupted-already/). This negative conclusion offers no better possibilities, as it is concluded that it is already too late and too far along this pathway for any meaningful middle ground. This commentary is intended for a broad group of potential readers, including authors and readers of this journal (who are active microbial scientists who need to adapt to individual manuscript identification numbers replacing volumes and page numbers), as well as the larger community interested broadly in scientific communication, and even our institutional librarians (who have experienced the disappearance of paper copies on their shelves, and especially unsustainable rapid increases in money costs at a time of very limited resources.

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Physical Activity in Children’s Health and Cognition

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