Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center

By Dagny Stuart A study led by Vanderbilt University Medical Center investigators found that rates of benign lung disease diagnosis varied widely by state following surgery for lung cancer. The results could have an impact on clinical guidelines and health policy for lung cancer screening. The study was presented by Stephen A. Deppen, M.A., M.S., [...]

Overcoming therapeutic resistance that inevitably develops is one of the major challenges in treating lung cancer. Non-small cell lung cancers that harbor mutations in the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) are initially responsive to targeted therapies known as EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs). However, most patients eventually develop resistance to these therapies. One such targeted [...]

A study led by investigators from Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center (VICC), Nashville, Tenn., finds that black men with prostate cancer receive lower quality surgical care than white men. The racial differences persist even when controlling for factors such as the year of surgery, age, comorbidities and insurance status. Daniel Barocas, M.D., MPH, assistant professor of Urologic [...]

MicroRNAs (miRNAs) play key roles in cellular development, differentiation and cancer growth by regulating gene expression. They may be clinically useful as biomarkers and as targets for new drugs to treat such cancers as glioblastoma multiforme, the most common and lethal primary brain tumor in humans. But first scientists must understand better how the actions [...]

Carlos Arteaga, M.D., associate director for Clinical Research and director of the Breast Cancer Program at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center (VICC), has been named to the Scientific Advisory Board of the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Breast Cancer Research Foundation. Komen is the one of the largest nonprofit organizations dedicated to funding breast cancer research [...]

Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center researchers have identified how one of the genes most commonly mutated in lung cancer may promote such tumors. The investigators found that the protein encoded by this gene, called EPHA3, normally inhibits tumor formation, and that loss or mutation of the gene – as often happens in lung cancer – diminishes this [...]

Stress can promote breast cancer cell colonization of bone, Vanderbilt Center for Bone Biology investigators have discovered. The studies, reported July 17 in PLoS Biology, demonstrate in mice that activation of the sympathetic nervous system – the “fight-or-flight” response to stress – primes the bone environment for breast cancer cell metastasis. The researchers were able [...]

Members of the Vanderbilt community have spent the past week sharing remembrances of a Nashville businesswoman who made an indelible mark on the Medical Center. Frances Williams Preston, one of the most successful female executives in the music industry and a member of the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center Board of Overseers, passed away at her Nashville [...]

Frances Williams Preston, one of the most successful female music executives in the history of the entertainment industry, and a member of the Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center Board of Overseers, died from congestive heart failure at her home in Nashville, surrounded by her family, Wednesday, June 13. She was 83. Mrs. Preston spent most of her [...]

A breast cancer patient who has enrolled in two clinical research trials at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center was the only presenter to receive a standing ovation during a recent Stand Up To Cancer (SU2C) news briefing at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) annual meeting in Chicago. Jeanette Daniel, 51, a metastatic breast cancer patient, [...]