Breast cancer remains a significant global health challenge, particularly in low- and middle-income countries where disparities in healthcare exacerbate the disease burden. The Breast Cancer Comprehensive Center at the National Cancer Institute, Cairo University, has implemented integrated patient navigation and education programs aimed at enhancing patient outcomes and healthcare quality. This study evaluated the effectiveness of these programs involving 2202 participants over 12 months.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose: Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the third most commonly diagnosed cancer worldwide and the second cause of cancer related mortality. Treatment options for patients with metastatic CRC (mCRC) expanded during the last two decades, with introduction of new chemotherapeutic and targeted agents. Egypt is a lower middle-income country; Egyptian health care system is fragmented with wide diversity in drug availability and reimbursement policies across different health care providing facilities.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe advent of immune-checkpoint inhibitors (ICI) in modern oncology has significantly improved survival in several cancer settings. A subgroup of women with breast cancer (BC) has immunogenic infiltration of lymphocytes with expression of programmed death-ligand 1 (PD-L1). These patients may potentially benefit from ICI targeting the programmed death 1 (PD-1)/PD-L1 signaling axis.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Burnout (BO) among oncology professionals (OP) is increasingly being recognized. Early recognition and intervention can positively affect the quality of care and patient safety. This study investigated the prevalence, work and lifestyle factors affecting BO among OPs in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFA correction to this article has been published and is linked from the HTML and PDF versions of this paper. The error has been fixed in the paper.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis is the second-largest retrospective analysis addressing the controversy of whether adult rhabdomyosarcoma (RMS) should be treated with chemotherapy regimens adopted from pediatric RMS protocols or adult soft-tissue sarcoma protocols. A comprehensive database search identified 553 adults with primary non-metastatic RMS. Increasing age, intermediate-risk disease, no chemotherapy use, anthacycline-based and poor chemotherapy response were significant predictors of poor overall and progression-free survival.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPurpose: Up to 30% of patients who undergo radiation for intermediate- or high-risk localized prostate cancer relapse biochemically within 5 years. We assessed if biochemical disease-free survival (DFS) is improved by adding 6 months of androgen suppression (AS; two injections of every-3-months depot of luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone agonist) to primary radiotherapy (RT) for intermediate- or high-risk localized prostate cancer.
Patients And Methods: A total of 819 patients staged: (1) cT1b-c, with prostate-specific antigen (PSA) ≥ 10 ng/mL or Gleason ≥ 7, or (2) cT2a (International Union Against Cancer TNM 1997), with no involvement of pelvic lymph nodes and no clinical evidence of metastatic spread, with PSA ≤ 50 ng/mL, were centrally randomized 1:1 to either RT or RT plus AS started on day 1 of RT.
Importance: Despite the rapidly declining number of physician-investigators, there is no consistent structure within medical education so far for involving medical students in research.
Objective: To conduct an integrated mixed-methods systematic review and meta-analysis of published studies about medical students' participation in research, and to evaluate the evidence in order to guide policy decision-making regarding this issue.
Evidence Review: We followed the PRISMA statement guidelines during the preparation of this review and meta-analysis.
Combined modality treatment can be used to improve control of the local disease at the expense of increased toxicity. Several randomized trials have demonstrated that this combined modality therapy is better than radiotherapy alone or chemotherapy alone in the treatment of locally advanced diseases. Several new targets as well as potential new radio-sensitizers have been identified.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: There is increasing recognition that quality of life (QoL) and patient-reported outcomes (PROs) are of fundamental importance and particularly relevant given the relatively high likelihood of long-term survival in most women with endometrial cancer (EC). However, there has been relatively little research focused on this topic. Our objective was to analyze our current knowledge and identify research questions to be included in the design of next clinical trials.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Quality of life (QoL) in endometrial cancer (EC) is understudied. Incorporation of QoL questionnaires and patient-reported outcomes in clinical trials has been inconsistent, and the tools and interpretation of these measures are unfamiliar to most practitioners. In 2012, the Gynecologic Cancer InterGroup Symptom Benefit Working Group convened for a brainstorming collaborative session to address deficiencies and work toward improving the quality and quantity of QoL research in women with EC.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRare diseases are a serious public health problem that presents unique challenges to many countries. There is no internationally accepted definition for rare diseases. Patients suffering from rare cancers often face challenges, including late or incorrect diagnoses, difficulties finding clinical expertise and accessing appropriate treatments, and uncertainty in clinical decision making, with difficult and rare access for these patients to clinical trials.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCrit Rev Oncol Hematol
October 2012
Background: This article is a review of the literature regarding the state of oncology education for medical students in developing countries, and possible solutions to the problems at hand.
Methods: Ovid MEDLINE, PubMed, ERIC, The Cochrane CENTRAL Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL) and Google Scholar were searched using the terms oncology, undergraduate, cancer, education and teaching.
Results: The search resulted in 40 relevant articles in total.
Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related death in US and Europe. Treatment with a platinum-based chemotherapy remains the standard of care, however with modest effect on quality of life and overall survival which seldom reaches 1 year. Recently, several classes of targeted agents have emerged showing promising results.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMcKee and Schover have suggested that sexuality is an aspect of intimacy that is frequently compromised by cancer and its treatments. Cancer, both in terms of diagnosis and treatments, may have a dramatic impact on both intimacy and sexuality. There is a body of published research addressing sexual concerns among patients with prostatic, testicular, breast, and rectal cancers.
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