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Chemotherapy
A new chemotherapy drug promises to treat some patients with pediatric acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) who have been unable to take the other two other chemo medicines because one can cause allergic reactions and the other is frequently in short supply. This summer, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) fast-tracked…
May 26 Update: Only 62.6% of patients taking methotrexate, an immunosuppressant drug used in some cancer patients, mounted an effective antibody response to Pfizer’s vaccine, according to a study Stephanie, a Stage 4 endometrial cancer patient who has undergone both chemotherapy and immunotherapy since 2019, has been especially cautious throughout the…
The immediate side effects of chemotherapy, radiation and immunotherapy that treat cancer are well known to those directly affected by them. The reactions can include debilitating nausea, fatigue and dizziness as well as hair loss. What you may not know is that certain adverse effects of these life-saving medicines can…
Pulmonary arterial hypertension is a disease of the lungs that can cause heart failure and death, and it’s being linked to an increasing number of common and oft-prescribed drugs. The journal Prescrire, reports that, as of 2020, amphetamines, immunosuppressants, certain cancer medications, and a handful of other select medications have been…
Are you considering taking a COVID-19 antibody test to see if you’ve already had the disease? Not all tests are equal. Read below to find out which tests the FDA has validated. Also, a new study was released which concludes how taking antidepressants while pregnant can affect the newborns. FDA…
Dry eye disease is irritating and painful. As an optometrist, I know there are many possible causes, but the medicines you take might be the culprit. Drugs are a common part of American life, 36% of people between the ages of 18-44 take between one and four medicines daily and…
Chemo travels throughout your body and is non-selective, meaning the drugs kill any cell that divides quickly anywhere in your body. Because of that, chemo has limited effectiveness and, as is widely known, very bad side effects. Is Artifical Intelligence the answer?
While about one-third of cancer patients use some type of complementary therapy, such as supplements, yoga or meditation, many don’t disclose this to their doctors – and that can be problematic, say researchers. Some of the concern is that supplements may contain other ingredients not listed on their labels that…
Your gender may influence how you experience chemotherapy side effects, as a new study has found that women are more likely to have them. Researchers analyzed data from trials involving 1,654 patients that received different combinations of chemotherapy for esophageal and stomach cancer. For common chemo side effects like nausea,…
A chemotherapy drug may be helping breast cancer spread to the lungs. That’s the surprising finding of researchers from The Ohio State University, who used a mouse model to discover that paclitaxel both allows breast cancer cells to escape from a tumor and simultaneously makes the lungs a more susceptible…
Giving patients with cancer the ability to report side effects from chemotherapy right away using an online reporting tool helps them live longer. Researchers at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City randomized 766 patients undergoing chemotherapy for solid tumors to receive either standard care or standard care…
Exercise – such as walking or jogging – helps patients with advanced gastrointestinal cancer to cope better with the side effects of chemotherapy. Participants in a study conducted by researchers at Goethe University Frankfurt took on slightly strenuous exercises either 3 times a week for 50 minutes or 5 times…
For women undergoing chemotherapy, losing one’s hair is one of the treatment’s most devastating side effects. However, researchers have discovered a “cooling cap” that is placed on the scalp may help women with breast cancer lose less hair as a result of chemotherapy. Researchers, led by those at the Dan…
The antipsychotic medication Zyprexa (olanzapine) appears to be effective in preventing the nausea and vomiting associated with chemotherapy. The trial enrolled 380 patients with cancer, the majority of whom had breast cancer. Patients received either chemotherapy plus Zyprexa, or chemotherapy and a placebo. Results, published in the New England Journal…
A systematic review published in The Journal of the American Medical Association looked at all randomized controlled trials of cannabis or cannabinoids to treat medical conditions. They found 79 trials involving more than 6,400 participants. Medical marijuana prevented nausea and vomiting due to chemotherapy (47% of those using it versus…
New research from scientists at the University of Pennsylvania using a mouse model of melanoma found that combining exercise with chemotherapy shrank tumors more than chemotherapy alone. The result indicated that the mice that both received chemotherapy and exercised had significantly smaller tumors after two weeks than mice that only…
