Circulating regulatory T cells from breast cancer patients in response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy.

Background: Immune escape of tumor cells is a new hallmark of cancer in general, and breast cancer, in particular. Previous studies have demonstrated that the immunological profile in peripheral blood may be a prognostic and/or predictive biomarker in breast cancer. Thus, higher number of regulatory T cells (Tregs) in blood from patients with breast cancer has been reported in relation to normal donors.

Relationship between osteoprotegerin and mortality in decompensated heart failure with preserved ejection fraction.

Aim: The aim of this study was to evaluate whether osteoprotegerin - an emerging inflammatory biomarker in cardiovascular diseases - predicts outcomes in patients with acute heart failure and preserved ejection fraction.

Methods: We measured urea, creatinine, hemoglobin, high-sensitivity C-reactive protein, N-terminal pro-B-type natriuretic peptide and osteoprotegerin on admission in 177 patients admitted with decompensated heart failure and left ventricular ejection fraction at least 45%. The population was divided according to the median values of osteoprotegerin (158.

Radiation for Awakening the Dormant Immune System, a Promising Challenge to be Explored.

Recent advances that have been made in our understanding of cancer biology and immunology show that infiltrated immune cells and cytokines in the tumor microenvironment may play different functions that appear tightly related to clinical outcomes. Strategies aimed at interfering with the cross-talk between microenvironment tumor cells and their cellular partners have been considered for the development of new immunotherapies. These novel therapies target different cell components of the tumor microenvironment and importantly, they may be coupled and boosted with classical treatments, such as radiotherapy.

New insights into the role of the immune microenvironment in breast carcinoma.

Recently, immune edition has been recognized as a new hallmark of cancer. In this respect, some clinical trials in breast cancer have reported imppressive outcomes related to laboratory immune findings, especially in the neoadjuvant and metastatic setting. Infiltration by tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TIL) and their subtypes, tumor-associated macrophages (TAM) and myeloid-derived suppressive cells (MDSC) seem bona fide prognostic and even predictive biomarkers, that will eventually be incorporated into diagnostic and therapeutic algorithms of breast cancer.

Correlation between the complex PSA/total PSA ratio and the free PSA/total PSA ratio, sensitivity and specificity of both markers for the diagnosis of prostate cancer.

Objective: To compare the behaviour of the PSAcomplex/PSAtotal percentage (PSAc%) against the PSA free/PSA total (PSAl%) and analyse both markers for their usefulness in diagnosing prostate cancer.

Material And Methods: We measured total PSA (PSAt), free PSA (PSAl), complex PSA (PSAc), PSAl% and PSAc% levels in 158 patients. Of these, 98 (62%) were biopsied for presenting PSAt≥3 ng/dl and PSAl%<20, PSAt>10, suspicious rectal examination or suspicious ultrasound node.