Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
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Query: UMLS:C0019829 (Hodgkin's disease)
 30,247 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Oestrogen receptors (ER) are present in neoplastic lymphoid cells and have been considered a physiological marker of growth rate or differentiation. Tamoxifen, an oestrogen antagonist, has been given in some patients with CLL and Hodgkin's disease, with dramatic response in single cases. Until now, ER status has been assessed using a steroid binding assay (SBA) which has many inherent problems. Recently, the development of monoclonal antibodies directed against ER has been applied to the study of breast carcinomas and results obtained show good correlation with the quantitative SBA. We studied 49 cases of B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) using immunostaining of cytospin preparations. In 30 of these cases ER enzyme immunoassay (ER-EIA) was also performed. Cultured MCF-7 cells, derived from a pleural effusion of a breast cancer patient, known to contain high levels of ER were used as a positive control (40-48% ER positive cells by immunocytochemistry; 200 fmol/mg protein by EIA). All of the CLL cases except two (96%) were negative for ER (less than 1% staining; less than 4 fmol/mg protein). The two positive cases expressed granular ER staining over the nucleus (9.2 and 12.1% positive cells) and were positive by EIA and SBA. It is concluded that (i) patients with CLL rarely express ER and (ii) immunocytochemical staining of cytospin preparations is a valid technique for the measurement of ER. It is of interest that one of the positive cases was diagnosed as CLL with Richter's transformation confirming earlier findings.
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PMID:Oestrogen receptor (ER) analysis in B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukemia: correlation of biochemical and immunocytochemical methods. 228 Jun 9

Phase III randomized clinical trials have greatly contributed to our understanding of the pathobiology of neoplastic disease and, particularly, to therapeutic progress. However, randomized Phase III studies are no better than or are critically dependent on Phase I and Phase II studies for positive therapeutic leads that are compelling enough to test in the Phase III arena. The variables involved in the series of randomized trials that led to the curative treatment of acute lymphocytic leukemia also resulted in an understanding of the principles of cancer therapy in therapeutic research. These principles, when applied to Hodgkin's disease in non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, testis cancer, childhood solid tumors, and others, resulted in a substantial cure rate for those diseases. However, for the adult epithelial common solid tumors, a second strategy, adjuvant chemotherapy, was required This has resulted in a 20% reduction in mortality in patients with node positive and node negative breast cancer. Tamoxifen has been similarly effective in patients with postmenopausal breast cancer. In colon cancer, adjuvant chemotherapy with fluorouracil plus levamisole has decreased mortality to a comparable degree. New agents, modulations, combination chemotherapy, and biotherapeutics are being addressed to the adjuvant situation which has proven effective in a variety of neoplastic diseases. A third strategy is neoadjuvant chemotherapy. This involves the use of chemotherapy first for patients with solid tumors, designed to down-stage the primary tumor thus making it more susceptible to less radical surgery and to organ- or limb-sparing procedures in osteogenetic sarcoma and in head and neck cancer. For example, neoadjuvant chemotherapy has not resulted in an increased survival as compared with the appropriate control but has allowed for important quality-of-life contributions, such as limb-sparing and radical surgery-sparing procedures. In addition to new agents and combination chemotherapy, dose is a critical variable. This is most evident clinically in the transplantation arena. Comparative studies recently completed, for example, in patients with adjuvant breast cancer and with acute leukemia indicate that dose is a significant factor in tumor control.
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PMID:Randomized clinical trials and other approaches in clinical research. 795 73

Breast cancer (BC) is the first female cancer in France, accounting for 49,240 new cases in 2004. Approximately 80% of those tumors have positive hormone receptors (HR). Tamoxifen was used in four chemoprevention randomized trials, as well as another SERM (Selective Estrogen Receptor Modulation), raloxifen. This review analyses the updated results of these trials. All trials have shown that the risk of developing HR positive BC was reduced by tamoxifen or raloxifen, but without impact on HR negative BC and overall survival. Moreover, several unfavorable side effects (thrombo-embolic accidents and uterine cancers) have been observed. A new assessment of BC risk factors seems necessary, including not only family history and some histopathological abnormalities (e.g. atypical hyperplasia), but also new elements such as high bone and breast density and thoracic irradiation at young age (Hodgkin's disease). Indeed, tamoxifen efficacy seems optimal in very "high-risk" women. Therefore, the creation of a new and most comprehensive "risk model" is necessary as well as a tailored SERM use (maybe with other compounds), in order to optimize results and reduce potential side effects.
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PMID:[Breast cancer chemoprevention. Rational, trials results and future]. 1946 83