Part 2 of the latest Annual Report to the Nation on the Status of Cancer finds that cancer patients in the United States shoulder a large amount of cancer care costs. In 2019, the national patient economic burden associated with cancer care was $21.09 billion, made up of patient out-of-pocket costs of $16.22 billion and patient time costs of $4.87 billion. Patient time costs reflect the value of time that patients spend traveling to and from health care, waiting for care, and receiving care, according to the report.

The report, appearing October 26, 2021, in JNCI: The Journal of the National Cancer Institute, is the most comprehensive examination of patient economic burden for cancer care to date and includes information on patient out-of-pocket spending by cancer site, stage of disease at diagnosis, and phase of care. While this analysis is about the costs that are directly incurred by patients, which are critical to patient finances, the total overall costs of cancer care and lost productivity in the United States are much larger.

Cleveland Clinic, Case Comprehensive Cancer Center researchers have opened a novel study for a vaccine aimed at eventually preventing triple-negative breast cancer, the most aggressive and lethal form of the disease.

This phase I trial is designed to determine the maximum tolerated dose of the vaccine in patients with early-stage triple-negative breast cancer and to characterize and optimize the body’s immune response. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration recently approved an investigational new drug application for the vaccine, which permits Cleveland Clinic and partner Anixa Biosciences, Inc. (ANIX:NASDAQ) to start the study.

“We are hopeful that this research will lead to more advanced trials to determine the effectiveness of the vaccine against this highly aggressive type of breast cancer,” said G. Thomas Budd, MD, of Cleveland Clinic’s Taussig Cancer Institute and principal investigator of the study. “Long term, we are hoping that this can be a true preventive vaccine that would be administered to healthy women to prevent them from developing triple-negative breast cancer, the form of breast cancer for which we have the least effective treatments.”

“This vaccine approach represents a potential new way to control breast cancer,” said Vincent Tuohy, PhD, the primary inventor of the vaccine and staff immunologist at Cleveland Clinic’s Lerner Research Institute. “The long-term objective of this research is to determine if this vaccine can prevent breast cancer before it occurs, particularly the more aggressive forms of this disease that predominate in high-risk women.” Tuohy is named as inventor on the technology, which Cleveland Clinic exclusively licensed to Anixa Biosciences, Inc. He will receive a portion of commercialization revenues received by Cleveland Clinic for this technology and also holds personal equity in the company.

According to new findings published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Cleveland Clinic, Case Comprehensive Cancer Center researchers have gained new insights into the connection between a high-fat diet and glioblastoma, the most common primary malignant brain tumor.

Findings from the team—led by Department of Cardiovascular & Metabolic Sciences researchers Justin Lathia, PhD, Daniel Silver, PhD, and Christopher Hine, PhD—confirm that a high-fat diet accelerates and intensifies glioblastoma in preclinical models and highlight the need for more research into the possible utility of dietary interventions to reduce disease risk and severity in humans.

“Glioblastoma has one of the most aggressive disease trajectories of any cancer and recurrence is quite common, due in large part to a dangerous subset of cancer cells called cancer stem cells,” explained Lathia, vice chair of the Department of Cardiovascular & Metabolic Sciences and co-director of the Center of Excellence in Brain Tumor Research and Therapeutic Development, and co-leader of the Molecular Oncology Program of the Case Comprehensive Cancer Center. “It is critical that we develop more effective therapies for patients with the disease.”

There will be no Cancer Center Seminar Series today. We will return November 5 to hear from invited speaker Chaitra Badve, MD, of the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine and University Hospitals.

October 29, 2021 - External Advisory Committee meeting. No seminar

Physician, Radiology, Neuroradiology/Diagnostic Radiology, University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center; Clinical Director, MRI, University Hospitals

Assistant Professor, Department of Radiology; Member, Cancer Imaging Program, Case Comprehensive Cancer Center, Case Western Reserve School of Medicine

Professor, Epidemiology, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine

Director, Center for Environmental Health and Technology

Head, Environmental Health Section, Department of Epidemiology

Brown University

Assistant Professor, Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Director of Cellular Immunotherapy, Cancer Center

Massachusetts General Hospital

November 26, 2021 - Thanksgiving Holiday. No seminar

Professor, Department of Pathology

Director, Center for Translational Research in the Molecular Genetics of Cancer

University of California, San Francisco

Registration is open for the 6th Annual Cancer Disparities Symposium: "The Intersection of Racism, Poverty and Biology in Cancer Prevention, Diagnosis and Treatment," presented by the Case Comprehensive Cancer Center Office of Community Outreach and Engagement.

This multi-disciplinary event will appeal to researchers, clinicians, health professionals, community outreach groups, community-based organizations, patient advocates and trainees. Keynote presentations will be delivered by renowned disparities researchers and community leaders, and a poster session highlighting academic research and community programs will provide a showcase of the depth and breadth of work happening in this field. Plus, there will be a discussion of "Biased: Uncovering the Hidden Prejudice That Shapes What We See, Think, and Do," a book by Jennifer L. Eberhardt.

Professor, Radiation Oncology

Vice Provost for Academic and Faculty Affairs

University of Michigan

There is still time to submit a nomination for the Office of Disease Prevention's (ODP) 2022 Early-Stage Investigator Lecture. The nomination deadline has been extended to November 5, 2021.

This award is made annually to early-career scientists who have made significant research contributions in disease prevention but who have not yet successfully competed for an R01 or R01-equivalent National Institutes of Health (NIH) research grant.

THRIVE provides seed grants for clinical and translational research and technology-based solutions that enhance our ability to predict when and how adverse effects may occur in patients who have received cancer treatment. THRIVE also supports the development of approaches to avoid or lessen these effects.

A number of late-phase clinical trials in prostate cancer have opened in recent months. … In the trial that is currently recruiting, participants will receive one injection of [Ga-68]PSMA [Gallium-68 Prostate-Specific Membrane Antigen] after which they will undergo a 30-minute PET/CT scan. Follow-up biopsy will be performed to enable comparison of the [Ga-68]PSMA) images with standard histopathology. The study opened in August and aims to recruit 100 participants at University Hospitals Cleveland Medical Center, Cleveland, OH. Overall survival (OS) and quality of life (QoL) will not be tracked.

Several years ago, Anant Madabhushi, a professor of biomedical engineering at Case Western Reserve University, used interpretability techniques to understand why some patients are more likely than others to have a recurrence of breast or prostate cancer. He fed patient scans to a neural network, and the network identified those with a higher risk of cancer reoccurrence.