This volume contains the main proceedings of the fourth international conference on "Cancer Prevention 2006," which was held during February 16-18, 2006, in St. Gallen, Switzerland. Written by international experts in the field, the book comprises a comprehensive update on the most recent developments in the upsurging fields of molecular biology and cancer genetics and their interactions with clinical epidemiology and cancer prevention at various levels.

One reason for failure to cure solid tumors by surgery appears to be the impossibility of controlling metastases that are present but latent at the time of operation. This failure is a common clinical experience with aggressive neoplasms. but it is not always appreciated in tumors with longer survival times. e. g .- breast and colon cancer. In addition. recent evidence indicates that after resection of a primary tumor micrometas- tases from it might be enhanced by suppression of immune and reticu- loendothelial functions of the host. Other factors, such as increase of coagulability and stress...

Pharmacologic interventions to prevent the evolution of human cancers are still in its infancy, although a good number o- mostly controlled - clinical studies have been performed in the past two decades. However, regarding the partially stagnating therapeutic results of major epithelial cancer types such as breast-, lung-, colon- and ENT-cancer types, the problem of in- terference with the evolution of disease at a preclinical level is an intriguing one, and the field seems to develop into one of the fastest growing domaines of modern oncology. This process is fa- cilitated by the...