abstract: Quality of life of parents diagnosed with cancer: change over time and influencing factors.

"Suffering from cancer while having parental responsibilities can amplify the psychosocial strain that the disease puts on the individual as well as on the whole family system.
Our longitudinal study examines changes in the quality of life of cancer patients in relation to parenthood. The quality of life of cancer patients is assessed with the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire 30-item version during the initial treatment period (T1) and compared to the quality of life 2 years later (T2). Two groups of patients are compared: those who have children below the age of 18 years (n= 41) and those who do not have children (n= 28). Shortly after being diagnosed with cancer (T1), both groups report a similarly low quality of life. Two years later (T2), individuals with children below the age of 18 report better quality of life on the majority of the dimensions assessed. However, variance analysis did not show that this is an independent effect of parenthood. In fact, having a partner and being female proved to impact the quality of life. These findings support the existing body of research on the influence of social support and gender on quality of life. The resulting limitations and suggestions on how to overcome them in further research are discussed."

abstract: Reframing eating during chemotherapy in cancer patients with chemosensory alterations

Purpose

Our purpose was to describe how eating is reframed among cancer patients experiencing chemosensory alterations.

Conclusion

To date, interventions to promote eating among cancer patients have focused extensively on symptom management and on recommendations for macro/micronutrient intake. This study underscores the importance of understanding beliefs about eating. These beliefs may help clinicians develop patient-centered nutritional interventions.

Longwoods: Research How Well Protected Are Canadian Research Participants: Who Knows?

Originally Published in Nursing Leadership, 21(4) : 1–5 November 2008

Commentary: Accountable Care Organizations and Community Empowerment - — JAMA

Less apparent to the public during this period of historic change are the struggles occurring in US board rooms among hospital groups, specialty physicians, and primary care clinicians—debating quietly but intensely over how to form these ACOs, how to be accountable for care delivery, and how to divide anticipated savings derived from ACOs. However, in most of these settings, important constituencies—middle class and other working patients whose health and welfare are at stake—are not included in the discussions.......................The high and accelerating increases in the cost of health care and the limited roles of patients in decision making central to health and health care delivery are too real to ignore. Decision making by distal proxies such as elected legislators may no longer be enough to address the United States' mounting problems with health care, outcomes, and costs.

International patient charters are often nonbinding or feature fuzzy metrics Part 3 of 3

Future Medicine - Full Text Cancer pharmacogenomics: do cancer cell lines have the right stuff?

Note: cell 'lines' (test tube) vs  patient tumors

"....But with all the effort and money being put into pharmacogenomics research using cancer cell lines, it is appropriate to ask: how faithfully do cancer cell lines represent the tumors that they are being used to model?"

"Next, do cancer cell lines behave similarly to the tumors they are intended to model to be useful for pharmacogenomics research? First, cancer cell lines are more appropriate for assessing the response to cytotoxic anticancer drugs, rather than the response to newer biologic agents which exert their anti-tumor effects via mechanisms other than eliciting cell death. Second, an important consideration to keep in mind when using cancer cell lines for pharmacogenomics research is that cell lines are generally more sensitive to cytotoxic agents than solid tumors.

"Another important question is: how well does testing in cancer cell lines predict responses in clinical trials with real world patients? When assessing whether there is a correlation between drug activity in Phase II clinical trials and preclinical activity in cancer cell line models, one study found that preclinical activity did not correlate with Phase II response, with the exception of non-small-cell lung cancer [5].

However, ..........It is becoming more and more apparent that the process of culturing cells in vitro alters the genetic make-up of the cancer cell lines."

Blog: Why We Blame Cancer Patients for Their Illness