Drs. Fen Xia and Anthony Cmelak observe as a patient is positioned for stereotactic radiosurgery for her tumor.

This system, called Novalis TX, offers precision to the millimeter — about the width of a fingernail. And it offers this precision in much shorter treatment sessions than other decade-old technology that is more widely available and marketed.

In this new video, Dr. Reid Thompson, chair of Neurosugery at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, and Dr. Arnold Malcolm, interim chair of Radiation Oncology, along with Adrian Newson, director of radiation therapy programs, discuss this new treatment and how it fits into Vanderbilt-Ingram’s approach of “personalized medicine.”

• You can also read about this new technology in the VUMC Reporter.
• See here an interview by WSMV-Channel 4 with one of the first patients who underwent this new approach to fighting cancer.
• Click here to learn more about our Radiation Oncology services, including our convenient locations in Clarksville and Franklin, Tenn., as well as our midtown Nashville facility on Vanderbilt University Medical Center’s main campus.

Following an extensive national search, Debra Friedman, M.D., has been named the director of the Division of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at Vanderbilt University.

Friedman, associate professor of Pediatrics and the E. Bronson Ingram Chair in Pediatric Oncology, has served as interim director since July.

“Our programs in pediatric cancer are our highest priority and I am truly delighted with this choice. Deb Friedman is an extraordinary individual who will lead the division with compassion and creativity,” said Jonathan Gitlin, M.D., James C. Overall Professor and chair of the Department of Pediatrics.

Debra Friedman, M.D.

“She is a skilled and effective leader with a very clear commitment to excellence in clinical care and outstanding scholarship. Our children and their families are in good hands.”

“I look forward to working with Dr. Friedman in her new role,” said Jeff Balser, M.D., Ph.D., vice chancellor for Health Affairs and dean of the School of Medicine. “Pediatric Hematology and Oncology is one of the places at Vanderbilt where every day we make tremendous differences in the lives of our patients, and I know this impact will continue and grow under her leadership.”

Friedman is the leader of the Cancer Control and Prevention Program at the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center and director of the REACH for Survivorship Program, a collaborative venture between the Department of Pediatrics, the Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt and the Cancer Center.

“It is an incredible honor to have been selected as the next director of the Division of Hematology/Oncology,” Friedman said.

“I am so fortunate to work with an exceptionally dedicated and talented faculty and staff. I look forward to working with all of them to advance our clinical and research enterprise to improve the lives of children and their families living with, through and after cancer.”

“As a National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center, one of Vanderbilt-Ingram’s most important roles is as a leader in cancer control, prevention and survivorship,” said Jennifer Pietenpol, Ph.D., director of the Cancer Center. “More than 12 million Americans are living with, and beyond, their cancer diagnosis, and we have a huge obligation to ensure that these folks not only survive but thrive after cancer.

“Nowhere is this more important than in the pediatric arena, where cancer survivors have many decades of life ahead of them.

“Having a world-renowned expert such as Dr. Friedman as both a leader of our cancer control and survivorship research as well as director of clinical care and research in pediatric hematology/oncology, assures a collaborative and integrated approach that is critical as we move forward.”

Friedman came to Vanderbilt in 2008 from Seattle, where she was director of the LiveStrong Survivorship Center of Excellence at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and director of the Cancer Survivorship Program at Children’s Hospital and Regional Medical Center.

Vanderbilt University School of Nursing is the official sponsor of the annual Pink Out basketball game on Sunday, Feb. 14.

The VU Commodores women’s basketball team will take on the Kentucky Wildcats at 5 p.m. in Memorial Gym in a game to support breast cancer awareness and research.

Players will replace the black and gold school colors with pink, and fans are also encouraged to wear pink to emphasize the need for breast cancer research.

The game is part of the Women’s Basketball Coaches Association’s “Pink Zone Week,” with more than 1,500 participating schools and organizations across the country.

All Vanderbilt undergraduates get in free with their I.D. Special discount tickets are available by calling Group Ticket Sales at 343-6010.

Vanderbilt Breast Center has launched monthly seminars to help women who are going through cancer treatment cope with the physical changes caused by chemotherapy or radiation.

The American Cancer Society-sponsored “Look Good…Feel Better” classes are offered at Vanderbilt Health One Hundred Oaks. The next free seminar is scheduled for Wednesday, Feb. 10, 10 a.m. to noon, followed by a light lunch.

The theme is “Life is sweet,” and participants will be treated to an assortment of cakes and desserts.

“These classes are an amazing gift to women undergoing chemotherapy or who have just finished their treatments,” said Heather Satterfield, Breast Center program coordinator.

“It is hard enough for women to undergo breast surgery and then they are faced with losing their hair, eyebrows and eyelashes, and having problems with their fingernails and complexion. These seminars let them reclaim their sense of femininity.”

During the two-hour class, participants learn how to draw their own eyebrows and apply makeup to give an impression of eyelashes. They receive tips on dealing with dry skin caused by radiation and chemotherapy. They also learn how to cover their heads and stay warm in stylish and inexpensive ways.

Each woman is given a free goody bag filled with brand-name cosmetics and other products valued at $300. Seating is limited.

For more information and to sign up, call 322-7563 or contact heather.r.lagore@vanderbilt.edu.

This event, which is free and open to the public, is believed to be the first community-wide event designed to inform Middle Tennessee residents about the important role that they can play in making medical advances possible and to celebrate the contributions of clinical research participants in moving science forward.

Anyone interested in learning about and participating in clinical research is invited to attend this event, from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. at Scarritt Bennett Center, 1008 19^th Ave., S., in Nashville, Tenn.

Attendees will hear from local participants and prominent doctors and researchers about their experiences with clinical research.

The event features:

• Information sessions on topics such as cancer, diabetes, heart diseases, vaccine research and more
• Free health screenings for blood pressure, blood glucose, body mass index, cholesterol and HIV infection
• An educational handbook
• Access to a nationwide database listing of clinical trials
• Exhibits
• Lunch

The event is hosted by the Center for Information and Study of Clinical Research Participation (CISCRP), a non-profit organization whose mission is to educate and inform the public and healthcare professionals about clinical trials.

In addition to Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center, participating local research organizations include:

• Vanderbilt Research
• Meharry Medical College and Nashville General Hospital;
• Saint Thomas Research Institute and Saint Thomas Health Services;
• Tennessee State University; and
• Sarah Cannon Cancer Center, Sarah Cannon Research Institute and Minnie Pearl Cancer Foundation.

Opening presentations will be given by Dr. Veronica Gunn, Chief Medical Officer of the Tennessee Department of Health and Dr. George Hill, Associate Dean for Diversity in Medical Education at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, who will join a panel of patients and physicians who will help attendees consider whether participating in clinical research is right for them.

Click here to learn more or to register.

Editor’s Note: To learn more about clinical trials at the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center, call our Clinical Trials Information Program at 1 (800) 811-8480 or visit our clinical trials website. To learn about non-cancer trials at Vanderbilt, visit the VUMC site.

Tissue growth — in normal development and in disease conditions such as cancer — relies on new blood vessels to bring in “supplies.”

Charles Lin, Ph.D., and graduate student Kimberly Covington in the lab at the Preston Research Building. (photo by Joe Howell)

Researchers at Vanderbilt University Medical Center have identified a new protein that participates in building blood vessels, a process called angiogenesis, during disease conditions, but not during normal physiological processes.

They report in the January issue of the Journal of Experimental Medicine that lowering levels of the protein, delta-catenin, halts tumor formation and wound healing in mice.

“Because delta-catenin specifically regulates pathological angiogenesis and has no effect on physiological angiogenesis, we think it may be a better therapeutic target for blocking blood vessel growth in disease conditions like cancer,” said Charles Lin, Ph.D., associate professor of Radiation Oncology, Cancer Biology and Cell & Developmental Biology.

Delta-catenin is a member of the family of p120 proteins, which participate in cell adhesion and were first identified by Albert Reynolds, Ph.D., at Vanderbilt. Delta-catenin was thought to be mainly in neuronal cells, until Lin and his team found it in endothelial cells (the cells that line blood vessels).

To explore a possible role for delta-catenin in angiogenesis, Lin and his colleagues used mice missing one or both copies of the delta-catenin gene.

Endothelial cells from the mice missing delta-catenin (one or both gene copies) had reduced cell motility and vascular structure formation, compared to cells from normal mice.

In models of tumor growth and wound healing, tumor growth and blood vessel density were reduced, and angiogenesis and wound closure were impaired in mice missing one or both copies of delta-catenin. In contrast, mice missing the delta-catenin gene had normal physiological hormone-induced angiogenesis in the uterus.

The fact that the defects in pathological angiogenesis are similar in mice missing only one copy of the delta-catenin gene (they still have one normal copy) and mice missing both copies suggests that the levels of delta-catenin are critical to its function in angiogenesis, Lin said.

“Only a very small number of genes have this type of gene dosage effect,” Lin said. “Delta-catenin may be a very sensitive target for therapeutics because even partial inhibition produces a response.”

Evidence from human beings supports this gene dosage effect, Lin noted. Patients with Cri-du-chat syndrome are missing one copy of the delta-catenin gene and have developmental delays, neuronal defects and congenital heart defects. The current findings that delta-catenin has a role in endothelial cell motility may explain the heart defects.

Lin and his colleagues also demonstrated that inflammatory signals, such as TNF-alpha and interleukin-1, increase delta-catenin expression in human endothelial cells in culture. The investigators propose that inflammation is the key difference between physiological and pathological angiogenesis.

“Our model is that in disease conditions, or tissue injury, the first response is inflammation,” Lin said. “Inflammatory cytokines then increase delta-catenin expression, which controls endothelial cell motility and pathological angiogenesis.”

Consistent with this model, the investigators found increased levels of delta-catenin in human lung cancer samples, compared to normal lung tissue.

Lin and his team plan to collaborate with Vanderbilt’s Program in Drug Discovery to develop inhibitors of delta-catenin or its signaling partners. Such inhibitors, he said, would be good leads for medications to treat cancer and other diseases where blood vessels overgrow, such as rheumatoid arthritis and retinopathy, a major cause of blindness.

Co-authors of the new study, which was featured on the journal cover, include Laura DeBusk, Ph.D., Kimberly Boelte and Yongfen Min, M.D., Ph.D. The research was supported by the National Institutes of Health.

Breast cancer patients who exercise and drink tea on a regular basis may be less likely to suffer from depression than other patients, according to a new study led by Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center’s Xiao Ou Shu, M.D., Ph.D.

Xiaoli Chen, M.D., post-doctoral fellow, was first author of the study published in the January issue of the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

Xiao Ou Shu, M.D., Ph.D

The study, conducted in collaboration with investigators from the Shanghai Institute of Preventive Medicine, examined 1,399 women enrolled in the Shanghai Breast Cancer Survival Study in China.

Each woman was interviewed about her exercise and diet habits six months following a breast cancer diagnosis. The women were interviewed again approximately 18 months after diagnosis and they also reported on their depressive symptoms. Twenty-six percent of the women reported depression during the follow-up survey — 13.4 percent had mild depression and 12.6 percent had clinical depression.

Depression may reduce a patient’s quality of life, increase the length of hospital stays and affect compliance with cancer therapy.

“We found that all types of exercise decreased the risk for clinical depression,” said Shu. “Women who exercised for two or more hours per week, and those who expended more energy during exercise were less likely to have depression than women who did not exercise.”

Those patients who increased their exercise level during the follow-up period were 42 percent less likely to report overall depression. However, quitting exercise or reducing exercise was not related to increased depression.

Women also were questioned about their tea-drinking habits and investigators estimated the amount of tea consumed.

“Tea consumption after diagnosis was inversely associated with the risk for mild depression,” said Shu. “Lifetime tea consumption also was inversely related to depression. This is the first epidemiologic evidence that tea consumption may be associated with lower risk for depression among breast cancer survivors, although this was not a prespecified hypothesis. This inverse association was independent of other risk factors for depression.”

Since this study was conducted among Chinese women living in Shanghai, the type of tea most commonly consumed was green tea. Tea and its constituents contain high levels of caffeine and catechin polyphenols, which have demonstrated antioxidant, anticarcinogenic and anti-inflammatory properties.

The study is ongoing and will allow the investigators to evaluate how depression changes over time and to assess the long-term effects of exercise and tea consumption on depression among breast cancer survivors.

Other investigators include Wei Lu, M.D., Ph.D., Ying Zheng, M.D., M.P.H., Kai Gu, M.D., Zhi Chen, M.D., Ph.D., and Wei Zheng, M.D., Ph.D., M.P.H.

The research was supported by grants from the Department of Defense Breast Cancer Research Program and the National Cancer Institute.

No worries. The webinar will be available for listening at your convenience as an archive. Registration to listen to the archive is required.

Murphy, associate professor of Medicine, discussed efforts to improve colorectal cancer care during the free live webinar on January 27. Topics included symptom management issues both during treatment and after therapy ends, including pain, neuropathy, skin rash, digestive issues, fatigue, “chemo brain” and mouth sores.

Murphy is director of the Cancer Supportive Care Program at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center, which provides services for patients with challenging symptom control issues. She chairs the Pain and Symptom Management Program Research Team, a multi-disciplinary group of investigators representing numerous schools, divisions and departments within Vanderbilt University Medical Center. The research team is dedicated to investigating symptom control, functional, psychiatric and quality of life issues facing cancer patients and their families. In addition, she serves as clinical director for the Supportive Care Clinic, which provides services for patients with challenging symptom control issues.

The webinar was presented by the Colon Cancer Alliance in partnership with Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center.

To register for access to the archived webinar, call toll-free 1 (877) 422-2030 or visit www.ccalliance.org/webinars.

Kim was recently featured on WSMV-Channel 4’s “Making a Difference” segment. See how Kim is making a difference in this story and accompanying video.

Click here for more information about services to support patients and families, including our Resource Center, transportation and lodging.

The T.J. Martell Foundation will host its annual Honors Gala in Nashville on March 22, presenting awards for achievement and service to Gov. Phil Bredesen, former U.S. Senator Dr. Bill Frist, music duo Brooks & Dunn and community leader Susan Simons.

The Martell Foundation supports cancer research at the Frances Williams Preston Laboratories at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center.

Read more about the upcoming gala and the recipients in this article at Tennessean.com