International Journal of Cancer Management
Volume:15 Issue: 10, Oct 2022

Patients with cancer are potentially vulnerable to COVID-19 infection due to the immune-compromised state of cancer or its treatment complications.

This study compared the COVID-19 mortality rate in cancer patients with and without a history of chemotherapy.

This registry-based cohort study launched from March 2020 to March 2021 contains 2350 records in which 64 COVID-19 patients with cancer were included, of which 27 patients underwent the chemotherapy plan within eight weeks before confirmed COVID-19. In addition, age and sex were matched in patients without a history of cancer as a control group. Two groups of cancer patients with and without a history of chemotherapy compared to the control group using cox proportional hazard regression models in Stata.10 software.

Patients with cancer had a higher hazard for in-hospital mortality from COVID-19 infection (adjusted HR; 2.27, 95% CI: 1.25 - 4.13, P = 0.007) after adjusting for age, sex, body mass index (BMI), and co-morbidities. Our result showed no significant association between chemotherapy and control groups (adjusted HR; 1.65, 95% CI: 0.60 - 4.56, P = 0.33).

Patients with cancer faced a risk of mortality from COVID-19 two times higher than those without cancer. However, chemotherapy did not increase the mortality following COVID-19 infection.

Patients with cancer are at an increased risk of mortality from COVID-19 infection. So, they are prioritized for vaccination. However, there is limited data about the immunogenicity, safety, and effectiveness of inactivated vaccines in preventing COVID-19 infection, hospitalization, and mortality in patients with cancer.

This study aimed to report the clinical characteristics of patients who had a positive PCR test after being fully vaccinated with the Sinopharm BBIBP-CorV Vaccine.

In this retrospective study, the data of patients with cancer were extracted from the electronic health records of a cancer center in Isfahan, Iran. All COVID-19 data from Isfahan province also was collected by Isfahan COVID-19 Registry (I-CORE). We described the clinical characteristics of patients with cancer who have a positive test more than 14 days after the second dose.

Two hundred twenty-two patients with cancer had at least one positive PCR test after the start of the COVID-19 vaccination. Of these, 9 (4.1%) breakthrough infections have occurred. Six (67%) of them had hematological malignancies. Six (67%) were hospitalized and 3 (33%) patients died. Two of them had recent chemotherapy and have hematological malignancies.

Vaccination is a good way to protect the population from COVID-19 complications and mortality, but it should be considered that fully-vaccinated patients with cancer are at risk of severe outcomes. Nevertheless, prioritizing cancer patients, especially those with hematological malignancies, or receiving chemotherapies for booster vaccines and studying the effectiveness of each COVID-19 vaccine for patients with cancer should be considered.

Borderline ovarian tumor (BOT) is a tumor most prevalent in young woman with desire to fertility. There are some controversies on the patient characteristic besides to the factors affecting the recurrence rate among different races.

The aim of this study is to evaluate clinicopathologic features of the tumor to discover the controversies on the topic.

Medical data of the all referred patients to Motahari clinic from January 2010 till October 2020 were recorded. Patient clinicopathologic characteristics affecting on outcome were evaluated. By using SPSS software, data were tested by chi-square and fish exact test. Also, log rank test was used for survival analysis

Totally 145 patients were enrolled. 61.4% versus 38.6% of the patients underwent fertility sparing surgery and radical surgery respectively with common characteristics of mostly belong to stage 1A disease (61.8% vs. 66.1%), unilateral (93.3% vs. 89.3%), serous histology (51.7% vs. 66.1%). The characteristics were different in the aspects of age and tumor size. In the aspect of recurrence rate, higher FIGO stage, younger age, tumor size less than 10cm, performing laparoscopy and fertility sparing surgery were with higher rate of recurrence (P-value < 0.05) while histology type of the tumor, lateralization, micropapillary, microinvasion, noninvasive peritoneal implants, receiving adjuvant chemotherapy and performing lymphadenectomy were not statistically significant for recurrence (P-value > 0.05). Two patients had malignant transformation.

Fertility sparing surgery was with more recurrence rate in borderline ovarian tumor patients. However, micropapillary, microinvasion were not significantly with higher recurrence rate in our study but they are challenging issues in border line ovarian tumors among different studies. Due to most prevalence of border line ovarian tumors in young women and desire of fertility preservation, we should notice more to clinicopathologic and surgery types affecting on recurrence of BOTs.

Spironolactone is a conventional drug widely in use for the treatment of heart failure and hypertension patients. On the other side recent studies have reported spironolactone can prevent growth and drug resistance in cancer stem cells (CSCs), by inhibiting DNA double-strand break (DSB) repair; suggesting its potential application in cancer therapy.

Our study aimed at assessing the potential cytotoxicity of spironolactone in human U87-MG glioblastoma cells.

Different concentrations of spironolactone (0 - 50 μM) for 48 and 72 h were used for treatment. Cell viability assay was carried out by the 4, 5-dimethylthiazole-2-yl, 2, 5-diphenyl tetrazolium (MTT) method. Apoptosis was evaluated using annexin V/PI staining and flow cytometry and colorimetric measurement of caspase 8 and 9 activity.

Our findings showed a significant dose-dependent cytotoxic effect of spironolactone with maximum effect in 30 μM (P-value < 0.05). Spironolactone can induce approximately 20% apoptotic cell death in U87-MG cancer cells which were mainly related to early apoptotic cells. Indeed, the activity of caspase 8 and 9 was significantly elevated in spironolactone-treated cells compared to mock control.

Findings showed the cytotoxic effect of spironolactone in U87-MG glioblastoma cancer cells in a mechanism dependent on apoptosis cell death induction. Our findings suggest the potential application of spironolactone in the treatment of glioblastoma in vitro.

Doxorubicin is a favorite drug for feasting many malignancies. All organs' hepatic toxic effects are destructive and lead to use with caution. Then, it is necessary to increase antioxidants accompanied with doxorubicin to reduce its toxicity. Vitamin E is an antioxidant with harmful consequences. Omega-3 is an antioxidant similarly. The healing capacity of Vitamin E- Omega-3 was investigated together against doxorubicin.

Thirty balb/c mice have divided a weight of 25 g into five equal groups of six mice each. The groups were classified as Control: normal saline; DOX: Doxorubicin; Vitamin E: Vitamin E + DOX; Omega-3; Omega-3 + DOX; Both Vitamin E- Omega-3 + DOX. The histopathology was set to describe vacuolar degeneration, inflammation, and necrosis. Immunohistochemistry was performed to estimate the expression of tumor necrosis factor (TNFα), demonstrating the inflammation.

DOX-induced hepatic injury and increased TNF-α expression were seen more than alone when co-administered with vitamin E and omega-3. A significant decrease was shown in the ALT, AST, GGT, and ALP levels compared to the control. The Glutathione peroxidase and Catalase enzyme activities were higher in the co-administered Vitamin E- Omega-3 group than that received Vit E or Omega-3.

Co-administration of Vitamin E and Omega-3 have a more repair capacity with controlling effects on Doxorubicin-induced liver toxicity.

Chondrosarcoma is regarded as the second most common primary bone malignancy following osteosarcoma.

The present study aimed at determining the epidemiology, incidence, and survival rate of chondrosarcoma in the Iranian population, according to the Iran National Cancer Registry (INCR).

In an epidemiological study, patients with limb chondrosarcoma were evaluated based on INCR data between 2008 and 2015. Data included patients’ demographic characteristics, date of diagnosis, location of the tumor, patient’s survival, and type of tumor based on the International Classification of Diseases for Oncology (ICD-O-3; first revision, third edition) were collected and analyzed.

Out of 732 enrolled patients, 425 patients (58.06%) were male and 307 (41.94%) were female with a mean age of 44.08 (SD = 19.31) and 45.06 (SD = 18.72), respectively. Age-standardized incidence rates (ASIR) were 1.73 and 1.27 per 1 million person-years for males and females, respectively. Conventional chondrosarcoma was the most common subtype with ASIR 1.28 and constituted 84.7% of patients with chondrosarcoma. About 71.03% of all Chondrosarcoma patients (70.35% of males and 71.99% of females) were between 20 to 59 years old. The 1-, 3-, 5-, and 7-year survival rates of patients were 0.87, 0.73, 0.57, and 0.47, respectively. Also, the mean survival time was 6.12 years (95% CI: 5.85 - 7.39).

The incidence of chondrosarcoma in Iran is not as high as in other countries, but as patients are younger in Iran, the survival rate is worse compared to other countries. Therefore, better case findings and better care are needed to improve the patients' outcomes in Iran.

Breast cancer disease is an important public health trouble in the world. Over the past 2 decades, incidences of breast cancer among Iranian women have shown an alarmingly rapid increase. Mammography screening can lead to early detection and management of breast cancer and it also plays an important preventive role in decreasing breast cancer, especially among women over 40 years old.

This paper aims at reporting the psychometric properties of a questionnaire on mammography behavior based on health action process approach (HAPA) model.

This cross-sectional study was performed between May and September 2017, and was attended by 400 women aged 40 years and older, in comprehensive health service centers in Iran. The research subjects were selected by multi-stage cluster sampling. The instrument was designed basis on the constructs of HAPA and current literature. The scale’s psychometric properties were examined by exploratory factor analysis (EFA), infraclass correlation coefficient (ICC), and Cronbach’s alpha.

The results showed 45 items of the questionnaire, 41 items had important item-to-total correlations (P < 0.05), and they were placed in 8 factors that contributed 60.88% of the scale variance.

The research findings contribute to the reliability and validity of the HAPA model for predictively evaluating mammography goals.

 Skin cancer, as one of the most common cancers, is partly associated with environmental conditions.

 The main purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of environmental factors on the incidence of skin cancer.

 The dataset contains the age-standardized incidence rate (ASR) of skin cancer in all provinces of Iran during a six-year period of time. Also, there were meteorological variables for a 29-year period for the provinces. We used the mean of meteorological variables for the 29-year period for each province as predictors. The ASR of skin cancer in each province in six years was considered as the response variable. Also, gender, latitude, altitude, wind speed, relative humidity, cloudy hours duration, and maximum air temperature in each province were considered independent variables. A mixed effects polynomial regression model was applied to data analysis.

 Based on the applied model, the trend of ASR of skin cancer in different provinces was statistically significant (P < 0.001). The ASR of skin cancer for males was more than the females (P < 0.001). Furthermore, the positive linear effect of latitude was significant (P = 0.002). However, the quadratic term showed a deceleration in the growth rate of skin cancer incidence with increasing latitude. Furthermore, there was a positive significant impact of altitude on skin cancer incidence (P = 0.045).

 Health policymakers in their prevention planning should consider geographical conditions as influencing factors on skin cancer incidence. Moreover, men should be given more attention as the main group at risk for this cancer.