Researchers are reporting that a new vaccine designed to treat breast cancer appears to be safe in women with advanced disease. It showed signs of slowing down tumor growth too.

The Neuvenge vaccine, made by Dendreon Corporation -- maker of the Provenge prostate cancer vaccine -- targets the aggressive Her-2 positive form of breast cancer, which affects 20 to 30 percent of breast cancer patients. Using immune cells from a cancer patient's own body, Neuvenge is a tailor-made therapy.

Reports about Neuvenge, published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology, indicate the vaccine did not cause any serious side effects and of the 18 women who participated in the Phase I study, there was a reduction in the size of a tumor in one patient. In three other women, the disease seemed to stabilize for as long as a year.

Biological therapy involves using your body's immune system to fight cancer. Depending on how well your immune system is currently functioning, it can simulate it, fix it or work in conjunction with it in the fight against cancer cells. Biological Response Modifiers (BRMs) use immune-system properties like antibodies and cytokines to bolster the immune system and help improve the health of the patient, particularly when undergoing chemotherapy. Some common BRMs include:

• Interferons: Helps cancerous cells transform into normal ones
• Interleukins: Stimulates some white blood cells to attack cancerous ones
• Monclonal Antibodies: Helps your body recognize harmful cancerous cells from normal ones
• Colony Stimulating factors: Helps produce immune system cells

To find out more about Biological Therapy drugs, click here.

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) is the most common form of leukemia in adults. According to the National Cancer Society an estimated 60,000 people are living throughout the United States with CLL.

An article published in The Lancet stated that the chemotherapy combination of Fludara plus Cytoxan improves progression free survival compared to therapy consisting of Fludara alone. The drugs used to treat CLL consist of Fludara, Cytoxan and chlorambucil. Recent studies have shown that Fludara in combination with Cytoxan to be the most effective treatment for CLL.

Researchers wanted to test to see if higher anticancer responses were seen with the combination of Fludara plus Cytoxan, treatment with Fludara alone or treatment with chlorambucil.

There's good news for prostate cancer patients who've had the disease spread to other parts of the body -- a new treatments, currently being tried out on hundreds of patients with promising results. The drug is called GVAX and it's referred to as a vaccine, although it doesn't work like most vaccines in the sense that it is administered after diagnosis and progression of the disease. According to this news story, GVAX works by adding prostate cancer cells to the body, but these new cells are unable to replicate.

Several members of my family have battled prostate cancer to varying degrees of success, and I know that it's really widespread. So this is great news, and I hope GVAX is the miracle the prostate cancer is looking for.

By the way, if you have prostate cancer, they're recruiting patients for their clinical trials.

A German biotech company has announced positive results from a genetically engineered herpes virus that is designed to kill cancer cells. It not only kills the cancer cells but leaves healthy tissue unharmed. Results from clinical trials has showed promise.

Being injected with a virus might seem strange but researchers believe that viruses could one day become a valuable addition to conventional cancer treatments.

The results have shown in animal testing and limited human testing the ability to kill colorectal and liver cancer cells.

The new approved treatment for spine metastasis uses radiofrequency to kill cancer cells in the spine. After the radiofrequency is delivered to the area with cancer, a type of cement mixture is delivered into the cavity site to fill the empty space which was once occupied by the cancer. This step provides stability to the spine.

This new treatment called Cavity Spinewand minimizes damage to the surrounding tissue since the treatment is placed directly where the cancer cells reside. Patients treated with this method have reported significant pain relief, sometimes even complete pain relief.

Less pain means improved quality of life, mobility and enables patients to continue on with their scheduled chemotherapy or radiation therapy.

Axitinib is an agent that targets angiogenesis -- blood supply to a tumor. It disrupts blood vessels that grow and provide nutrients to cancer cells. Without the nutrients and oxygen supplied by blood vessels, cancer cells cannot grow or replicate.

Researchers conducted a trial to evaluate axitinib in the treatment of metastatic breast cancer. Patients were either given Taxotere or Taxotere plus axitinib. Anticancer responses were achieved in 40 percent of patients treated with the addition of axitinib to Taxotere, compared with only 23 percent of patients treated with Taxotere alone.

The researchers concluded -- that the addition of axitinib to Taxotere improves anticancer responses and delays cancer progression compared to Taxotere alone in the treatment of metastatic breast cancer.

Nasopharyngeal cancer is most prevalent in South China and kills one in every three victims. The disease is thought to be linked to diets rich in preserved foods, like salted fish.

Scientists will soon test an experimental treatment for nose and throat cancer that will train the patient's own white blood cells to fight the disease. Some classes of T-cells have memory. Once these cells are taken from the patient and are exposed to invaders that they successfully fought off, they should launch the same response when they are re-introduced back into the patients own body.

One of the researchers stated "We expect the T-cells to initiate a very aggressive inflammatory reaction and during the process, not only will the T-cells attack the cancer cells, but other immune cells in the body will be called in to eradicate the cancer cells".

The two little girls who recently fashioned their own cardboard lemonade stand and sold their homemade refreshments for 50 cents a cup are not your typical lemonade entrepreneurs. What makes them stand out from the usual crowd of lemonade peddlers? These girls -- Emily is four and Lily is six -- are both cancer patients, undergoing chemotherapy for acute lymphoblastic leukemia and raising money for cancer research.

The two met last year at the Omaha Children's Hospital cancer clinic. Their mothers became fast friends, worked together on a neighborhood garage sale, and invited the little girls to set up a lemonade stand. The idea came from the story of another little girl, diagnosed with cancer just before her first birthday, who at age four opened her own stand with the goal of raising $1 million for her hospital. Only days before she died did she realize she would reach her goal.

How did Emily and Lily do? The totals are not yet in -- but they did raise $70 right away on the first day of the sale. And they reportedly had a grand time running their business.

I am a Licensed Practical Nurse with five years' experience in this profession. I believe it is essential to go back to the basics in all things in order to really understand them. I am fascinated by how our bodies work and I hope I can get my readers to share my fascination. I hope we all learn new things and marvel again at the things we already know. This feature -- which includes a closing section on how disease affects the topic in question -- will run on The Cancer Blog on Wednesdays, and The Cardio Blog and The Diabetes Blog on Thursdays. [The contents in this post are for informational purposes only and should not be construed as medical advice or substitute for professional medical care.]

We start with the cell, because so much of what happens to us when we get sick, and how we get healthy again, can be explained by what happens on a cellular level. The cell is extremely complex and I will only touch on the basics in these posts, but at least we can have a rudimentary understanding.

Structure of cells

A cell has three basic parts:

1) Plasma membrane: A membrane lies at the border of cells and consists of lipids and proteins. See my post of 23 May on the cell membrane

2) Cytoplasm: All the cellular contents between the plasma membrane and the nucleus and can be further divided into the Cytosol and Organelles. We will discuss the organelles in today's post.

3) Nucleus: Technically an organelle, but usually considered separately because of its numerous and diverse functions.

Organelles

Organelles are specialized structures that evolved to perform specific functions. We could probably discuss each organelle in a separate post, because each one has it's own characteristic shape and function. i decided to keep this very basic and just list the different organelles, what they look like and what their basic function is. We will also just look at the "famous" organelles. There are other organelles, but the ones we discuss will give us a good understanding of what goes on inside the cell.

I love it when I find research coming straight from the halls of the very hospital where I received my breast cancer treatment. It reminds me that I'm in good hands, that University of Florida researchers are on the cusp of breaking through the mysteries of cancer, that I may one day be the lucky recipient of cutting-edge discoveries, like this:

University of Florida researchers report in a paper to be published in the August issue of Stem Cells that bone marrow stem cells attracted to the site of cancerous growths often take on the appearance of the malignant cells surrounding them. While these cells look like cancer, though, they may not act like cancer. They have the same skin, says lead study author Dr. Chris Cogle. But the question is: do they have the same guts?

"Our results indicate these cells act as developmental mimics; they come in and look like the surrounding neoplastic tissue, but they aren't actually the seed of cancer," said Cogle who is affiliated with the cancer center I've called home for more than two years.

I am a Licensed Practical Nurse with five years' experience in this profession. I believe it is essential to go back to the basics in all things in order to really understand them. I am fascinated by how our bodies work and I hope I can get my readers to share my fascination. I hope we all learn new things and marvel again at the things we already know. This feature -- which includes a closing section on how disease affects the topic in question -- will run on The Cancer Blog on Wednesdays, and The Cardio Blog and The Diabetes Blog on Thursdays. [The contents in this post are for informational purposes only and should not be construed as medical advice or substitute for professional medical care.]

We start with the cell, because so much of what happens to us when we get sick, and how we get healthy again, can be explained by what happens on a cellular level. The cell is extremely complex and I will only touch on the basics in these posts, but at least we can have a rudimentary understanding.

Structure of cells

A cell has three basic parts:

1) Plasma membrane: This post will discuss the membrane in more detail.

2) Cytoplasm: All the cellular contents between the plasma membrane and the nucleus and can be further divided into the Cytosol and Organelles.

3) Nucleus: Technically an organelle, but usually considered separately because of its numerous and diverse functions.

Membrane

A membrane lies at the border of the cells. It consists of lipids and proteins.

Phospholipids (one of the three classes of membrane lipids) are formed into what is called a lipid bilayer. This occurs because it is amphiphilic (containing both hydrophobic and hydrophilic properties).The hydrocarbon tails of the molecule are hydrophobic (water repelling) and its polar head is hydrophilic (water loving). As the plasma membrane faces watery solutions on both sides, its phospholipids accommodate this by forming a phospholipid bilayer with the hydrophobic tails facing each other. Picture a row of heads facing the outside of the cell -- which contains water -- with the tails facing in and another layer of the heads facing the inside of the cell with the tails facing in.

Childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) is being studied in a way to examine the chromosomes present in the diseased cells. Extra numbers of specific chromosomes are present and can arise according to a predictable pattern.

What does this mean? Our chromosomes carry the genes in all cells, which normally have 46 chromosomes. The ALL cells that are being studied can have more than 80 chromosomes.

This could help to understand what early events can cause this type of leukemia. The researchers also want to understand why children with ALL that have 51 or more chromosomes generally respond better to treatment than those with 50 or fewer chromosomes.

One of the authors of the study, Nyla A. Heerema, professor of pathology, states "The fact that an excess of certain chromosomes is associated with the particular overall number of chromosomes tells us that something significant happens when that first abnormal cell divides and initiates the disease"

Researchers are trying to figure out why these certain patterns occur and whether it can help guide decisions about therapy.

I'm no cook. And I'll never claim a recipe is my own. Anyone who likes my taco salad should thank my friend Kim and her mom Kathy. My turkey meatballs: all credit goes to my brother-in-law's mom. The brownies I once whipped up and now have given up: kudos to Betty Crocker. And this recipe I'm about to share comes straight from the pages of the May 2007 issue of Family Circle magazine. It's such a simple recipe -- takes five minutes tops. I probably could have invented it on my own. But I didn't.

Go With The Grain

Top 1 cup whole-grain cereal with:

2 tablespoons ground flaxseed
1/2 cup each strawberries and raspberries
1 cup 1% milk