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We added a new articles on Medulloblastomas and another on Atypical teratoid rhabdod tumor:
Our old vice president, Steve Mandell, has set up a few programs to try to raise money for the Musella Foundation.
I participate in one of them - the Legal Shield plan.. for a monthly fee, you get access to legal work, such as preparing your will, or fighting the insurance company denials.
Take a look and if there is anything you could use, each of them generates income for the Musella Foundation.
From our friends at the David S. Zocchi Brain Tumor Center
I disagree with this study.. the virus might not directly cause the tumors but it is very possible and likely that they can influence the tumor to be more malignant.. and I feel that CMV is an important target for GBM treatments
This is a fantastic event.. it already generated over $400,000 to brain tumor research. Perfect location on the beach. If you can't make it, you can participate as a virtual runner from home!
It never made sense to me to stop Temodar at 6 months. The reason they always give is that is the length of time used in the trial was 6 months so they use that. However, that 6 months was chosen to allow the trial to conclude quickly. They never tested varying lengths of treatment against each other. The other argument to end treatment early was increased chance of side effects. This article shows in a small group, that it is relatively safe to continue for an extended period of time. There is also the risk of developing a secondary cancer - but that risk is smaller than the original tumor growing back and killing you.
There is still time too register. This is going to be a good one! Registration is required but it is free!
This is an exciting finding.. these researchers have shown that Avastin does make the GBM cells more invasive. (A recent article we posted here said that it doesn't), at least in the test tube. They also show that adding dasatinib would stop that invasiveness. They are now about to try it in human trials. WIll watch this one closely. Best part is that both drugs are available now - Avastin is approved for GBMs and dasatinib is approved for leukemia but can be used off label for anything.
This article is about the Novocure system. They now have over 100 centers in the USA that are certified to use it.
This is our main educational event of the year! Aside from education, it serves a very important social function - we can meet in real life - you can talk to people going through the same ordeal and talk to some of the best brain tumor doctors and nurses. A free registration is required. Everyone who attends says it was worth the effort to come.
This article shows that - in the lab - a common food additive that has been deemed "safe" by the FDA may have anti tumor properties and in the test tube may help Temodar work better. Of course, this isn't in humans so we do not know yet if it would help people, but I love the idea of using a readily available, cheap, nontoxic to increase the chances that Temodar would help..
Unfortunately, this trial didn't turn out well. They used cilengitide by itself and most children progressed quickly. This is an interesting drug. I think it will turn out that it is very useful - but in combination with other treatments as part of a comprehensive cocktail approach. I hope these negative results do not stop further research into combinations.
This also points out an important point when looking at results. They had a 3 year survivor who is still doing well. If that person happened to be in an online support group - the people in that group might tend to think - wow - this is a miracle drug - since they didn't see the other people in the trial doing poorly, they assume the trial worked. But what happens is that in some cases - particularly children, some people do well no matter what treatment you do to them. You need to compare the results of the experimental group to what would be expected with standard treatments and show an improvement. You can not judge by 1 or a few individual cases.
The Musella Foundation funded this experiment! The concept is excellent - the thinking was if Avastin cuts off the blood supply to the tumor, the tumor cells will try to find a new blood supply by migrating towards areas of higher oxygen content. This makes the tumor resistant to Avastin. If you combine Avastin with a drug that stops the invasion, you may prevent the resistance and kill the entire tumor. We funded a prior research project that showed BMP4 has an anti invasion effect so it seemed like a good candidate for this experiment.
Unfortunately, it didn't work out as expected. The Avastin did not increase the invasiveness of the tumor! Since there was no increased invasiveness, the BMP4 didn't have much effect. Since other experiments we funded have shown that Avastin does increase invasiveness in a different mouse model, I think this experiment should be repeated in a few other models and perhaps try a few different anti-invasive drugs.
This is an exciting new treatment. It is a next generation combination targeting 2 pathways:
1. an antiangiogenic drug - which blocks the formation of new blood vessels, which starves the tumor
2. Anti-invasion - so the tumor cells can't spread out looking for a new blood supply.
I mentioned this last week but it just came out as a press release!
From our friends at the Albert Heath Services.
Very Important Article. First the warnings: 1. this is a small study, funded in part by the company that makes the drug. 2. It was not randomized, and there was no control group - they compare to historical cotnrols.. 3. We have seen other treatments do very well in small, selected patients then not do well in large controlled trials.
Having said that, these results are outstanding, doubling the average survival time by using a simple, easily available (but expensive) anti-viral pill. It is probably too soon to say we should try it but I would say it definately needs another trial, and I wouldn't hesitate to enter the trial if I had a gbm.
For more background, read the articles on virtualtrials.com on this concept: Click HERE and here and HERE
