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Deep Learning Technology: Sebastian Arnold, Betty van Aken, Paul Grundmann, Felix A. Gers and Alexander Löser. Learning Contextualized Document Representations for Healthcare Answer Retrieval. The Web Conference 2020 (WWW'20)
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Simple surgical excision is considered curative. Rare recurrences have been reported.
Uterine fibroids can be treated with the same methods like sporadic uterine fibroids including antihormonal treatment, surgery or embolisation. Substantially elevated risk of progression to or independent development of uterine leiomyosarcoma has been reported which may influence treatment methods.
The predisposition to renal cell cancer calls for screening and, if necessary, urological management.
The skin lesions may be difficult to treat as they tend to recur after excision or destructive treatment. Drugs which affect smooth muscle contraction, such as doxazosin, nitroglycerine, nifedipine and phenoxybenzamine, may provide pain relief.
Topical lidocaine patches have been reported to decrease in severity and frequency of pain cutaneous leiomyomas.
In localized, resectable adult GISTs, if anatomically and physiologically feasible, surgery is the primary treatment of choice. Surgery can be potentially curative, but watchful waiting may be considered in small tumors in carefully selected situations. Post-surgical adjuvant treatment may be recommended. Lymph node metastases are rare, and routine removal of lymph nodes is typically not necessary. Laparoscopic surgery, a minimally invasive abdominal surgery using telescopes and specialized instruments, has been shown to be effective for removal of these tumors without needing large incisions. The clinical issues of exact surgical indications for tumor size are controversial. The decision of appropriate laparoscopic surgery is affected by tumor size, location, and growth pattern.
Radiotherapy has not historically been effective for GISTs and GISTs do not respond to most chemotherapy medications, with responses in less than 5%. However, three medications have been identified for clinical benefit in GIST: imatinib, sunitinib, and regorafenib.
Imatinib (Glivec/Gleevec), an orally administered drug initially marketed for chronic myelogenous leukemia based on bcr-abl inhibition, also inhibits both "c-kit" tyrosine kinase mutations and PDGFRA mutations other than D842V, is useful in treating GISTs in several situations. Imatinib has been used in selected neoadjuvant settings. In the adjuvant treatment setting, the majority of GIST tumors are cured by surgery, and do not need adjuvant therapy. However, a substantial proportion of GIST tumors have a high risk of recurrence as estimated by a number of validated risk stratification schemes, and can be considered for adjuvant therapy. The selection criteria underpinning the decision for possible use of imatinib in these settings include a risk assessment based on pathological factors such as tumor size, mitotic rate, and location can be used to predict the risk of recurrence in GIST patients. Tumors <2 cm with a mitotic rate of <5/50 HPF have been shown to have lower risk of recurrence than larger or more aggressive tumors. Following surgical resection of GISTs, adjuvant treatment with imatinib reduces the risk of disease recurrence in higher risk groups. In selected higher risk adjuvant situations, imatinib is recommended for 3 years.
Imatinib was approved for metastatic and unresectable GIST by the US FDA, February 1, 2002. The two-year survival of patients with advanced disease has risen to 75–80% following imatinib treatment.
If resistance to imatinib is encountered, the multiple tyrosine kinase inhibitor sunitinib (marketed as Sutent) can be considered.
The effectiveness of imatinib and sunitinib depend on the genotype. cKIT- and PDGFRA-mutation negative GIST tumors are usually resistant to treatment with imatinib as is neurofibromatosis-1-associated wild-type GIST. A specific subtype of PDGFRA-mutation, D842V, is also insensitive to imatinib.
Regorafenib (Stivarga) was FDA approved in 2013 for advanced GISTs that cannot be surgically removed and that no longer respond to imatinib (Gleevec) and sunitinib (Sutent).
Treatment of rhabdomyosarcoma is a multidisciplinary practice involving the use of surgery, chemotherapy, radiation, and possibly immunotherapy. Surgery is generally the first step in a combined therapeutic approach. Resectability varies depending on tumor site, and RMS often presents in sites that don't allow for full surgical resection without significant morbidity and loss of function. Less than 20% of RMS tumors are fully resected with negative margins. Fortunately, rhabdomyosarcomas are highly chemosensitive, with approximately 80% of cases responding to chemotherapy. In fact, multi-agent chemotherapy is indicated for all patients with rhabdomyosarcoma. Before the use of adjuvant and neoadjuvant therapy involving chemotherapeutic agents, treatment solely by surgical means had a survival rate of <20%. Modern survival rates with adjuvant therapy are approximately 60–70%.
There are two main methods of chemotherapy treatment for RMS. There is the VAC regimen, consisting of vincristin, actinomyocin D, and cyclophosphamide, and the IVA regimen, consisting of ifosfamide, vincristin, and actinomyocin D. These drugs are administered in 9–15 cycles depending on the staging of the disease and other therapies used. Other drug and therapy combinations may also show additional benefit. Addition of doxorubicin and cisplatin to the VAC regimen was shown to increase survival rates of patients with alveolar-type, early-stage RMS in IRS study III, and this same addition improved survival rates and doubled bladder salvage rates in patients with stage III RMS of the bladder.
Radiation therapy, which kill cancer cells with focused doses of radiation, is often indicated in the treatment of rhabdomyosarcoma, and the exclusion of this treatment from disease management has been shown to increase recurrence rates. Radiation therapy is used when resecting the entirety of the tumor would involve disfigurement or loss of important organs (eye, bladder, etc.). Generally, in any case where a lack of complete resection is suspected, radiation therapy is indicated. Administration is usually following 6–12 weeks of chemotherapy if tumor cells are still present. The exception to this schedule is the presence of parameningeal tumors that have invaded the brain, spinal cord, or skull. In these cases radiation treatment is started immediately. In some cases, special radiation treatment may be required. Brachytherapy, or the placement of small, radioactive “seeds” directly inside the tumor or cancer site, is often indicated in children with tumors of sensitive areas such as the testicles, bladder, or vagina. This reduces scattering and the degree of late toxicity following dosing. Radiation therapy is more often indicated in higher stage classifications.
Immunotherapy is a more recent treatment modality that is still in development. This method involves recruiting and training the patient's immune system to target the cancer cells. This can be accomplished through administering small molecules designed to pull immune cells towards the tumors, taking immune cells pulled from the patient and training to attack tumors through presentation with tumor antigen, or other experimental methods. A specific example here would be presenting some of the patient's dendritic cells, which direct the immune system to foreign cells, with the PAX3-FKHR fusion protein in order to focus the patient's immune system to the malignant RMS cells. All cancers, including rhabdomyosarcoma, could potentially benefit from this new, immune-based approach.
Surgery, with as wide a margin of removal as possible, has generally been the most effective and preferred way to attack LMS. If surgical margins are narrow or not clear of tumor, however, or in some situations where tumor cells were left behind, chemotherapy or radiation has been shown to give a clear survival benefit. While LMS tends to be resistant to radiation and chemotherapy, each case is different and results can vary widely.
LMS of uterine origin do frequently, but not always respond to hormonal treatments.
Based on a survey of >800, surgical removal of the entire involved kidney plus the peri-renal fat appeared curative for the majority of all types of mesoblastic nephroma; the patient overall survival rate was 94%. Of the 4% of non-survivors, half were due to surgical or chemotherapeutic treatments. Another 4% of these patients suffered relapses, primarily in the local area of surgery rare cases of relapse due to lung or bone metastasis.. About 60% of these recurrent cases had a complete remission following further treatment. Recurrent disease was treated with a second surgery, radiation, and/or chemotherapy that often vincristine and actinomycin treatment. Removal of the entire afflicted kidney plus the peri-renal fat appears critical to avoiding local recurrences. In general, patients who were older than 3 months of age at diagnosis or had the cellular form of the disease, stage III disease, or involvement of renal lymph nodes had a higher recurrence rate. Among patients with these risk factors, only those with lymph node involvement are recommended for further therapy.
It has been suggested that mesoblastic nephroma patients with lymph node involvement or recurrent disease might benefit by adding the ALK inhibitor, crizotinib, or a tyrosine kinase inhibitor, either larotrectinib or entrectinib, to surgical, radiation, and/or chemotherapy treatment regimens. These drugs inhibit NTRK3's tyrosine kinase activity. Crizotinib has proven useful in treating certain cases of acute lymphoblastic leukemia that are associated with the "ETV6-NTRK3" fusion gene while larotrectinib and entrectinib have been useful in treating various cancers (e.g. a metastatic sarcoma, papillary thyroid cancer, non-small-cell lung carcinoma, gastrointestinal stromal tumor, mammary analog secretory carcinoma, and colorectal cancer) that are driven by mutated, overly active tyrosine kinases. Relevant to this issue, a 16-month-old girl with infantile fibrosarcoma harboring the "ETV6–NTRK3" fusion gene was successfully trated with larotrectinib. The success of these drugs, howwever, will likely depend on the relative malignancy-promoting roles of ETV6-NTRK3 protein's tyrosine kinase activity, the lose of ETV6-related transcription activity accompanying formation of ETV6-NTRK3 protein, and the various trisomy chromosomes that populate mesoblastic nephroma.
Therapy is based on staging and patient condition and utilizes one or more of the following approaches.
Surgery is the mainstay of therapy if feasible involving total abdominal hysterectomy with bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy. Other approaches include radiation therapy, chemotherapy, and hormonal therapy.
Prognosis is relatively poor.
Sirolimus is an mTOR inhibitor that stabilizes lung function and improves some measures of life in LAM patients. It is approved by the FDA for use in LAM, based on the results of the Multicenter International LAM Efficacy and Safety of Sirolimus (MILES) Trial. MILES data supports the use of sirolimus in patients who have abnormal lung function (i.e. FEV1<70% predicted). Whether the benefits of treatment outweigh the risks for asymptomatic LAM patients with normal lung function is not clear, but some physicians consider treatment for declining patients who are approaching the abnormal range for FEV1. Sirolimus also appears to be effective for the treatment chylous effusions and lymphangioleiomyomatosis. The benefits of sirolimus only persist while treatment continues. The safety of long term therapy has not been studied.
Potential side effects from mTOR inhibitors include swelling in the ankles, acne, oral ulcers, dyspepsia, diarrhea, elevation of cholesterol and triglycerides, hypertension and headache. Sirolimus pneumonitis and latent malignancy are more serious concerns, but occur infrequently. Sirolimus inhibits wound healing. It is important to stop therapy with the drug for 1–2 weeks before and after elective procedures that require optimal wound healing. Precautions must be taken to avoid prolonged sun exposure due to increased skin cancer risk.
Treatment with another mTOR inhibitor, everolimus, was reported in a small, open-label trial to be associated with improvement in FEV1 and six-minute walk distance. Serum levels of VEGF-D and collagen IV were reduced by treatment. Adverse events were generally consistent with those known to be associated with mTOR inhibitors, although some were serious and included peripheral edema, pneumonia, cardiac failure and "Pneumocystis jirovecii" infection. Escalating doses of everolimus were used, up to 10 mg per day; higher than what is typically used clinically for LAM.
Serum VEGF-D concentration is useful, predictive and prognostic biomarker. Higher baseline VEGF-D levels predicts more rapid disease progression and a more robust treatment response.
Hormonal approaches to treatment have never been tested in proper trials. In the absence of proven benefit, therapy with progesterone, GnRh agonists (e.g., Lupron, goserelin) and tamoxifen are not routinely recommended. Doxycycline had no effect on the rate of lung function decline in a double blind trial.
Sirolimus is often effective as first-line management for chylothorax. If chylous leakage or accumulations persist despite treatment, imaging with heavy T2 weighted MRI, MRI lymphangiography or thoracic duct lymphangiography can be considered. Pleural fusion procedures can be considered in refractory cases.
Estrogen-containing medications can exacerbate LAM and are contraindicated. Agents that antagonize the effects of estrogen have not been proven to be effective for treatment, but no proper trials have been done. A trial of bronchodilators should be considered in LAM patients, because up to 17% to 25% have bronchodilator-responsive airflow obstruction. Oxygen should be administered to maintain oxyhemoglobin saturations of greater than 90% with rest, exercise and sleep. Bone densitometry should be considered in all patients who are immobilized and/or on antiestrogen therapies, and appropriate therapy instituted for osteoporotic patients. Proper attention should be paid to cardiovascular health following natural or induced menopause. Immunizations for pneumococcus and influenza should be kept up to date. Pulmonary rehabilitation seems to be particularly rewarding in young, motivated patients with obstructive lung disease, but studies to assess this intervention's effect on exercise tolerance, conditioning and quality of life have not been done.
The treatment or management of cachexia depends on the underlying causes, the general prognosis and other person related factors. Reversible causes, underlying diseases and contributing factors are treated if possible and acceptable. A growing body of evidence supports the efficacy of (HMB) as a treatment for reducing, or even reversing, the loss of muscle mass, muscle function, and muscle strength that occurs in hypercatabolic disease states such as cachexia; consequently, it is recommended that both the prevention and treatment of muscle wasting conditions include supplementation with HMB, regular resistance exercise, and consumption of a high-protein diet. Progestins such as megestrol acetate are a treatment option in refractory cachexia with anorexia as a major symptom.
Cachexia occurs less frequently now in HIV/AIDS than in the past due to the advent of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART). Treatment involving different combinations for cancer cachexia is recommended in Europe, as a combination of nutrition, medication and non-drug-treatment may be more effective than monotherapy. Non-drug therapies which have been shown to be effective in cancer induced cachexia include nutritional counselling, psychotherapeutic interventions, and physical training. Anabolic-androgenic steroids like oxandrolone may be beneficial in cancer cachexia but their use is recommended for maximal 2 weeks since a longer duration of treatment increases the burden from side effects.
Other drugs that have been used or are being investigated in cachexia therapy, but which lack conclusive evidence of efficacy or safety, and are not generally recommended include:
- Thalidomide and cytokine antagonists
- Cannabinoids
- Omega-3 fatty acids, including eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA)
- Non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs
- Prokinetics
- Ghrelin and ghrelin receptor agonist
- Anabolic catabolic transforming agents such as MT-102
- Selective androgen receptor modulators
- Cyproheptadine
- Hydrazine
Medical marijuana has been allowed for the treatment of cachexia in some US states, such as Illinois, Maryland, Delaware, Nevada, Michigan, Washington, Oregon, California, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Vermont, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Maine, and New York Hawaii and Connecticut.
There is insufficient evidence to support the use of oral fish oil for the management of cachexia associated with advanced cancer.
Treatment of a thyroid nodule depends on many things including size of the nodule, age of the patient, the type of thyroid cancer, and whether or not it has spread to other tissues in the body.
If the nodule is benign, patients may receive thyroxine therapy to suppress thyroid-stimulating hormone and should be reevaluated in 6 months. However, if the benign nodule is inhibiting the patient's normal functions of life; such as breathing, speaking, or swallowing, the thyroid may need to be removed.
Sometimes only part of the thyroid is removed in an attempt to avoid causing hypothyroidism. There's still a risk of hypothyroidism though, as the remaining thyroid tissue may not be able to produce enough hormones in the long-run.
If the nodule is malignant or has indeterminate cytologic features, it may require surgery. A thyroidectomy is a medium risk surgery that can result complications if not performed correctly. Problems with the voice, nerve or muscular damage, or bleeding from a lacerated blood vessel are rare but serious complications that may occur. After removing the thyroid, the patient must be supplied with a replacement hormone for the rest of their life. This is commonly a daily oral medication prescribed by their endocrinologist.
Radioactive iodine-131 is used in patients with papillary or follicular thyroid cancer for ablation of residual thyroid tissue after surgery and for the treatment of thyroid cancer. Patients with medullary, anaplastic, and most Hurthle cell cancers do not benefit from this therapy. External irradiation may be used when the cancer is unresectable, when it recurs after resection, or to relieve pain from bone metastasis.
Surgery is important in the treatment of most sarcomas. Limb sparing surgery, as opposed to amputation, can now be used to save the limbs of patients in at least 90% of extremity tumor cases. Additional treatments, including chemotherapy and radiation therapy, may be administered before and/or after surgery. Chemotherapy significantly improves the prognosis for many sarcoma patients, especially those with bone sarcomas. Treatment can be a long and arduous process, lasting about a year for many patients.
- Liposarcoma treatment consists of surgical resection, with chemotherapy not being used outside of the investigative setting. Adjuvant radiotherapy may also be used after surgical excision for liposarcoma.
- Rhabdomyosarcoma is treated with surgery, radiotherapy, and/or chemotherapy. The majority of rhabdomyosarcoma patients have a 50–85% survival rate.
- Osteosarcoma is treated with surgical resection of as much of the cancer as possible, often along with neoadjuvant chemotherapy. Radiotherapy is a second alternative although not as successful.
Everolimus is FDA approved for the treatment of angiomyolipomas. Treatment should be considered for asymptomatic, growing AML measuring larger than 3 cm in diameter.
Angiomyolipoma do not normally require surgery unless there is life-threatening bleeding. Some centres may perform preventative selective embolisation of the angiomyolipoma if it is more than 4 cm in diameter, due to the risk of haemorrhage.
People with tuberous sclerosis are advised to have yearly renal scans, though it is possible that patients with very stable lesions could be monitored less frequently. The research in this area is lacking. Even if no angiomyolipoma is found, one can develop at any life stage. The angiomyolipoma can grow rapidly.
In tuberous sclerosis, typically many angiomyolipomas affecting each kidney. It is not uncommon for more than one intervention to be required during lifetime. Since kidney function may already be impaired (up to half the kidney may be lost before function loss is detectable), it is vital to preserve as much kidney as possible when removing any lesion. Large angiomyolipomas are treated by embolisation which reduces the risk of haemorrhage and can also shrink the lesion. A side effect of this treatment is postembolisation syndrome: severe pain and fever however this is easily managed and lasts only a few days.
A ruptured aneurysm in an angiomyolipoma leads to blood loss that must be stopped (though embolisation) and compensated for (through intravenous fluid replacement). Therefore, removal of the affected kidney (nephrectomy) is strongly discouraged though may occur if the emergency department is not knowledgeable about tuberous sclerosis.
Embolisation involves inserting a catheter along the blood vessels to the tumour. The blood vessels are then blocked, typically by injecting ethanol or inert particles. The procedure can be very painful, so analgesics are used. The destroyed kidney tissue often causes post-embolisation syndrome, which manifests as nausea, vomiting, fever and abdominal pain, and lasts a few days. Embolisation (in general) has an 8% rate of morbidity and a 2.5% rate of mortality, so is not considered lightly.
Patients with kidney loss should be monitored for hypertension (and treated for it if discovered) and avoid nephrotoxic drugs such as certain pain relievers and IV contrast agents. Such patients who are unable to communicate effectively (due to age or intellectual disability) are at risk of dehydration. Where multiple or large angiomyolipomas have caused chronic kidney disease, dialysis is required.
Robotic assisted partial nephrectomy has been proposed as a surgical treatment of a ruptured angiomyolipoma combining the advantages both of a kidney preservation procedure and the benefits of a minimal invasive procedure without compromising the safety of the patient.
In terms of treatment for neuromuscular diseases (NMD), "exercise" might be a way of managing them, as NMD individuals would gain muscle strength. In a study aimed at results of exercise, in muscular dystrophy and Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, the later benefited while the former did not show benefit; therefore, it depends on the disease Other management routes for NMD should be based on medicinal and surgical procedures, again depending on the underlying cause.
Selective α-blockers are the most common choice for initial therapy. They include alfuzosin, doxazosin, silodosin, tamsulosin, and terazosin. They have a small to moderate benefit. All five are equally effective but have slightly different side effect profiles. Alpha blockers relax smooth muscle in the prostate and the bladder neck, thus decreasing the blockage of urine flow. Common side effects of alpha blockers include orthostatic hypotension (a head rush or dizzy spell when standing up or stretching), ejaculation changes, erectile dysfunction, headaches, nasal congestion, and weakness.
Tamsulosin and silodosin are selective α1 receptor blockers that preferentially bind to the α1A receptor in the prostate instead of the α1B receptor in the blood vessels. Less-selective α1 receptor blockers such as terazosin and doxazosin may lower blood pressure. The older, less selective α1-adrenergic blocker prazosin is not a first line choice for either high blood pressure or prostatic hyperplasia; it is a choice for patients who present with both problems at the same time. The older, broadly non-selective alpha blocker medications such as phenoxybenzamine are not recommended for control of BPH. Non-selective alpha blockers such as terazosin and doxazosin may also require slow dose adjustments as they can lower blood pressure and cause syncope (fainting) if the response to the medication is too strong.
Smooth muscle tumor of uncertain malignant potential, abbreviated STUMP, is an uncommon tumor of the uterine smooth muscle that may behave like a benign tumor or a cancerous tumor.
This tumor should not be confused with the prostatic stromal tumor of uncertain malignant potential which may be abbreviated the same way ("STUMP").
The Bell criteria were developed to help categorize them and differentiate them from their main differential diagnoses, leiomyosarcoma and uterine leiomyoma.
Myosarcoma is a malignant muscle tumor. People with myosarcoma often wake up with the feeling as if they had a cramp during their sleep.
Leiomyosarcoma is sarcoma of smooth muscle, and rhabdomyosarcoma is sarcoma of striated muscle. However, the term myosarcoma itself still appears in the literature.
In medicine, desmoplasia is the growth of fibrous or connective tissue. It is also called desmoplastic reaction to emphasize that it is secondary to an insult. Desmoplasia may occur around a neoplasm, causing dense fibrosis around the tumor, or scar tissue (adhesions) within the abdomen after abdominal surgery.
Desmoplasia is usually only associated with malignant neoplasms, which can evoke a fibrosis response by invading healthy tissue. Invasive ductal carcinomas of the breast often have a scirrhous, stellate appearance caused by desmoplastic formations.
The 5α-reductase inhibitors finasteride and dutasteride may also be used in men with BPH. These medications inhibit the 5α-reductase enzyme, which, in turn, inhibits production of DHT, a hormone responsible for enlarging the prostate. Effects may take longer to appear than alpha blockers, but they persist for many years. When used together with alpha blockers, no benefit was reported in short-term trials, but in a longer term study (3–4 years) there was a greater reduction in BPH progression to acute urinary retention and surgery than with either agent alone, especially in patients were more severe symptoms and larger prostates. Other trials have confirmed reductions in symptoms, within 6 months in one trial, an effect that was maintained after withdrawal of the alpha blocker. Side effects include decreased libido and ejaculatory or erectile dysfunction. The 5α-reductase inhibitors are contraindicated in pregnant women because of their teratogenicity due to interference with fetal testosterone metabolism, and as a precaution, pregnant women should not handle crushed or broken tablets.
Smooth muscle tumours show a smooth muscle differentiation. There are two main types of smooth muscle tumour: the benign leiomyoma and the malignant leiomyosarcoma.
Leiomyosarcoma, also referred to as LMS, is a malignant (cancerous) smooth muscle tumor. A benign tumor originating from the same tissue is termed leiomyoma. It is also important to note that while it has been believed that leiomyosarcomas do not arise from leiomyomas, there are leiomyoma variants for which classification is evolving.
About 1 person in 100,000 gets diagnosed with LMS each year. Leiomyosarcoma is one of the more common types of soft-tissue sarcoma, representing 10 percent to 20 percent of new cases. (Leiomyosarcoma of the bone is more rare.) Sarcoma is rare, consisting of only 1 percent of cancer cases in adults. Leiomyosarcomas can be very unpredictable. They can remain dormant for long periods of time and recur after years. It is a resistant cancer, meaning generally not very responsive to chemotherapy or radiation. The best outcomes occur when it can be removed surgically with wide margins early, while small and still in situ.
10-year survival rates for mucinous tumors is excellent in the absence of invasion.
In the case of borderline tumors confined to the ovary and malignant tumors without invasion, the survival rates are 90% or greater. In invasive mucinous cystadenocarcinomas, the survival is approximately 30%
Intranodal palisaded myofibroblastoma, abbreviated IPM, is a rare primary tumour of lymph nodes, that classically presents as an inguinal mass.
It afflicts predominantly males of middle age.
Only limited treatment options exist for patients with clinical cancer cachexia. Current strategy is to improve appetite by using appetite stimulants to ensure adequate intake of nutrients. Pharmacological interventions with appetite stimulants, nutrient supplementation, 5-HT antagonists and Cox-2 inhibitor have been used to treat cancer cachexia, but with limited effect.
Studies using a more calorie-dense (1.5 kcals/ml) and higher protein supplementation have suggested at least weight stabilization can be achieved, although improvements in lean body mass have not been observed in these studies.
Therapeutic strategies have been based on either blocking cytokines synthesis or their action. Thalidomide has been demonstrated to suppress TNF-alpha production in monocytes "in vitro" and to normalize elevated TNF-alpha levels "in vivo". A randomized, placebo-controlled trial in patients with cancer cachexia showed the drug was well tolerated and effective at attenuating loss of weight and lean body mass (LBM) in patients with advanced pancreatic cancer. An improvement in the LBM and improved quality of life were also observed in a randomized, double-blind trial using a protein and energy-dense, omega-3 fatty acids-enriched oral supplement, provided its consumption was equal or superior to 2.2 g of eicosapentaenoic acid per day. It is also through decreasing TNF-alpha production. However, data arising from a large, multicenter, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial indicate EPA administration alone is not successful in the treatment of weight loss in patients with advanced gastrointestinal or lung cancer.
Peripheral muscle proteolysis, as it occurs in cancer cachexia, serves to mobilize amino acids required for the synthesis of liver and tumor protein. Therefore, the administration of exogenous amino acids may theoretically serve as a protein-sparing metabolic fuel by providing substrates for both muscle metabolism and gluconeogenesis. Studies have demonstrated dietary supplementation with a specific combination of high protein, leucine and fish oil improves muscle function and daily activity and the immune response in cachectic tumor-bearing mice. In addition, β-hydroxy-β-methyl butirate derived from leucine catabolism used as a supplement in tumor-bearing rats prevents cachexia by modifying NF-κB expression.
A phase-2 study involving the administration of antioxidants, pharmaconutritional support, progestin (megestrol acetate and medroxyprogesterone acetate), and anticyclooxygenase-2 drugs, showed efficacy and safety in the treatment of patients with advanced cancer of different sites suffering cachexia. These data reinforce the use of the multitargeted therapies (nutritional supplementation, appetite stimulants, and physical activity regimen) in the treatment of cancer cachexia.
New studies indicate NSAIDS, like Sulindac, were found to significantly decrease cachexia.
Also studies have shown branched-chain amino acids can return the metabolism of a cachectic patient from catabolic-losing weight- to anabolic- increasing muscle, in over 55% of patients. Branched-chain amino acids consist primarily of leucine and valine. In a research paper published by the Indian J of Palliat Care, the effects the findings concluded that bcaa's interfere with brain serotonergic activity and inhibit the overexpression of critical muscular proteolytic pathways. The potential role of branched-chain amino acids as antianorexia and anticachexia agents was proposed many years ago, but experimental studies and clinical trials have since tested their ability to stimulate food intake and counteract muscle wasting in anorectic, weight-losing patients. In experimental models of cancer cachexia, BCAAs were able to induce a significant suppression in the loss of body weight, producing a significant increase in skeletal muscle wet weight[30] as well as in muscle performance and total daily activity.
The conditionally essential amino acid glutamine has been used as a component of oral supplementation to reverse cachexia in patients with advanced cancer or HIV/AIDS.
A leiomyoma, also known as fibroids, is a benign smooth muscle tumor that very rarely becomes cancer (0.1%). They can occur in any organ, but the most common forms occur in the uterus, small bowel, and the esophagus. Polycythemia may occur due to increased erythropoietin production as part of a paraneoplastic syndrome.
The word is from "" + "" + "", "smooth-muscle tumor".