It is a time to recognize how cancer research has taught and guided us with respect to risk factors, screenings, stage of the disease, recurrence, survival rates, and treatment guidelines including treatments using the body’s own immune system.
Research is described as the driving force behind clinical advances and our best defense against cancer. Per the American Cancer Society, the overall cancer deaths have continued to decline over the last decade. At the forefront of cancer research is immunotherapy, precision medicine, influence of health disparities, and the development and use of liquid biopsies. One new type of immunotherapy is CAR T-cell therapy. CAR T-cell therapy or gene therapy is described as making changes to a patient’s T cells in a lab in order to better fight cancer. Kymriah was the first gene therapy approved by the FDA and this drug is used to treat Leukemia and Lymphoma patients.
Another type of therapy approved by the FDA is Trodelvy. Trodelvy has been approved for triple negative breast cancer that has spread to other parts of the body and has not responded to other treatments. It is a type of targeted therapy called an antibody drug conjugate. It works by delivering a chemotherapy agent directly to the cancer cells to keep it from growing and spreading.
The data collected by the Cancer Registry plays a vital role in Cancer Research. Healthcare providers, public health officials, and researchers use the data to conduct research on the etiology, diagnosis, and treatment of cancer. We would like to thank our family of CTRs for their contribution to quality data collection and reporting. They are the starting point in gathering the data and adhere to strict rules to ensure consistent collection for meaningful cancer research.
For the latest information on cancer research please visit the American Cancer Society and the National Cancer Institute website.
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Photo by National Cancer Institute on Unsplash