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Patients play a pivotal role
After her experience in the Herceptin test, Teresa Lundberg has become an advocate for clinical trials.
“To this day, if there were a trial I was a candidate for, I’d be the first to raise my hand because I’ve seen so much good come from these trials,” she said.
Lundberg credits support from family and friends and the resources and support at the cancer center for her positive experience.
“The staff in the infusion room are walking angels,” said Lundberg. “Then there was Pam Carney, the clinical trials nurse who helped coordinate my care. Pam was absolutely my guardian angel because I didn’t have to worry about making appointments, when to get my blood work done and where I was supposed to be. She was my relaxing soul.”
Lundberg says she now recommends that other adults consider clinical trials.
Patients also contribute to scientific discovery when researchers are allowed to study tissue and blood samples obtained during biopsies and surgeries. As scientists develop new theories, it’s crucial for them to test those ideas by studying human samples to search for blood and tumor biomarkers.
Vanderbilt has created a massive DNA databank with as many
as 50,000 DNA samples obtained from blood specimens by late 2008. The Ayers Institute for Pre-Cancer Detection and Diagnosis
at Vanderbilt-Ingram is building another repository for colon polyps. Because colon polyps often become cancerous, this database of tissue samples is helping researchers gain insights into what causes polyps and whether they are likely to recur. One of the goals of the Ayers Institute is to create a blood test that would predict colon cancer.
A blood test to predict or confirm the presence of cancer is the scientific community’s magic quest. While researchers are moving
forward on this quest, the prize has proved to be elusive. David Carbone, M.D., Ph.D., professor of Medicine and co-director of the Vanderbilt-Ingram Lung Cancer SPORE, is focused on developing such a blood test for lung cancer because it is the most common cancer without an approved screening and early detection test. Far too many lung cancer patients aren’t diagnosed until the disease is advanced, and this delayed diagnosis is just one of the reasons only 15 percent
of people diagnosed with lung cancer are alive five years later.
“The most common imaging tests simply tell us there is something suspicious in one of the nodes in the lung,” explained Carbone. “We have to do an invasive test to find out if the tissue is cancerous. We believe there is a better way to get the answer by looking at proteins in the blood that could serve as biomarkers for lung cancer.”
This search for biological targets is the hallmark of today’s cancer research, and since each cancer patient’s biological signature is different, scientists say treatments are becoming much more individualized.
“The challenge is how to rationally combine multiple drugs for the right patient,” according to Carlos Arteaga. “We’re trying to determine how to predict, based on the genetic makeup of the tumor at the time of diagnosis, what would be the two or three combinations that would be rational for that patient and that will be well-tolerated and affordable. Those are big questions and the essence of personalized medicine. That’s a major frontier.” 
Find out more about the NCI’s translational research working group and other initiatives by logging on at www.cancer.gov and entering “translational research” into the search box.
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