The Science of Cancer Treatment

ISBN-13: 9789401068048 / Angielski / Miękka / 2012 / 224 str.

B. a. Ponder; M. J. Waring

Opis

Many of the most effective treatments for disease have been discovered empir ically. Nowadays, however, we think that understanding the biology of a disease will lead us to design better treatments, and to improve the application of treatments we already have. To accomplish this, vast sums are expended on cancer research. Even so, to the casual observer of clinical oncology the proliferation of studies and trials of ever-different combinations of therapies looks like empiricism, at the best. In the first part of this book, we have asked practising clinicians in different specialities to assess the contributions of biology and of empiricism to current approaches to treatment. In the second part, we have asked researchers in different areas of biology applied to cancer to assess the present and likely future impact of their type of biology on cancer treatment and control. IX 1 Surgery M.BAUM OBJECTIVES OF CANCER TREATMENT The objectives of cancer treatment can be defined according to population requirements or according to the needs of the individual. As far as the population is concerned, Government authorities are entitled to expect that cancer treatment will lead to mortality reductions and cost containment."

Spis treści

Section I: Current Approaches to Cancer Treatment: Empiricism or Applied Biology.- 1 Surgery.- 2 Radiotherapy and its relationship to radiobiology.- 3 The evolution of current chemotherapy regimes.- 4 New endocrine therapies for cancer.- Section II: New Approaches.- 5 Drug resistance and the problem of treatment failure.- 6 The detection of minimal disease and implications for cure.- 7 High-dose chemotherapy.- 8 Cytokine therapy.- 9 Targeted therapy: cell surface targets.- 10 Dietary intervention trials in subjects at high risk for breast cancer.