Opioid Prescribing and Use Among Cancer Survivors: A Mapping Review of Observational and Intervention Studies.

Context: Recent years show a sharp increase in research on opioid use among cancer survivors, but evidence syntheses are lacking, leaving knowledge gaps. Corresponding research needs are unclear.

Objectives: To provide an evidence synthesis.

Associations of novel variants in , and of the ATM pathway genes with pancreatic cancer risk.

The ATM serine/threonine kinase (ATM) pathway plays important roles in pancreatic cancer (PanC) development and progression, but the roles of genetic variants of the genes in this pathway in the etiology of PanC are unknown. In the present study, we assessed associations between 31,499 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in 198 ATM pathway-related genes and PanC risk using genotyping data from two previously published PanC genome-wide association studies (GWASs) of 15,423 subjects of European ancestry. In multivariable logistic regression analysis, we identified three novel independent SNPs to be significantly associated with PanC risk [ rs76692125 G>A: odds ratio (OR)=1.

Multicenter analysis of recurrence and survival in stage IIIA endometrial cancer.

Objective: To determine factors related to recurrence and survival in women with stage IIIA endometrial cancer; to examine outcomes of women with IIIA1 disease.

Methods: Multi-institutional analysis of women with stage IIIA endometrial carcinoma undergoing hysterectomy, bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy, lymphadenectomy, and pelvic cytology between 1980 and 2008. Overall survival (OS) and recurrence-free disease specific survival (RFDSS) were compared using Kaplan-Meier method, univariate and multivariate analyses.

Optimization of a 90Sr/90Y radiation source train stepping for intravascular brachytherapy.

A steepest-descent gradient algorithm is developed to optimize the stepping of a 90Sr/90Y radiation source train (RST) for intravascular brachytherapy (IVB). The objective function is to deliver a uniform dose in a coronary target vessel and minimize the dose in adjacent normal vessel tissue at the proximal and distal edges of the coronary target vessel. Based on the target length and number of dwell points (number of steps), the algorithm modulates the dwell times and corresponding dwell positions that optimize the weighted addition of staggered EGS4 Monte Carlo (MC) calculated dose distribution from a single RST.