BRIGHAM AND WOMEN’S HOSPITAL

Leukemic cutaneous T-cell lymphoma (L-CTCL) is a leukemia arising from T-cells, a type of white blood cell. This cancer can involve the skin and other organs, and patients often die within three years. Rachael A. Clark, MD, PhD, BWH assistant professor of dermatology and associate dermatologist and Thomas Kupper, MD, BWH Department of Dermatology chairman and their colleagues now report a new study that low-dose Campath (alemtuzumab) not only treats patients with L-CTCL but does so without increasing their risk of infections. Campath was previously believed to kill all lymphocytes (T-cells and B-cells) in the body and render patients susceptible to infections. However, Clark and Kupper found that Campath only kills T-cells that enter the bloodstream, but it spares a newly discovered population of T-cells that live long-term in the tissues. Learn more at http://bit.ly/A7XRLl

CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL BOSTON

Children at risk for dyslexia show differences in brain activity on MRI scans even before they begin learning to read, finds a study at Children’s Hospital Boston. Since developmental dyslexia responds to early intervention, diagnosing children at risk before or during kindergarten could head off difficulties and frustration in school, the researchers say. The Children’s Hospital Boston researchers, led by Nora Raschle, PhD, of the Laboratories of Cognitive Neuroscience, performed functional MRI imaging in 36 preschool-age children (average age, 5½) while they performed tasks requiring them to decide whether two words started with the same speech sound. During the phonological tasks, children with a family history of dyslexia had reduced metabolic activity in certain brain regions (the junctions between the occipital and temporal lobes and the temporal and parietal lobes in the back of the brain) when compared with controls matched for age, IQ and socioeconomic status. Learn more at http://bit.ly/ytkU10

MASSACHUSETTS GENERAL HOSPITAL

A report from investigators at the Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center has defined the role of a recently identified gene abnormality in a deadly form of lung cancer. Tumors driven by rearrangements in the ROS1 gene represent 1 to 2 percent of non-small-cell lung cancers (NSCLC), the leading cause of cancer death in the U.S. The researchers show that ROS1-driven tumors can be treated with crizotinib, which also inhibits the growth of tumors driven by an oncogene called ALK, and describe the remarkable response of one patient to crizotinib treatment. “ROS1 encodes a protein that is important for cell growth and survival, and deregulation of ROS1 through chromosomal rearrangement drives the growth of tumors,” says Alice Shaw, MD, PhD, of the MGH Cancer Center – co-lead author of the paper. “This finding is important because we have drugs that inhibit ROS1 and could lead to the sort of dramatic clinical response we describe in this paper.” Learn more at http://bit.ly/xDj2Tw

MEDTRONIC, INC.

Medtronic, Inc. announces the initiation and first patient enrollment in a clinical study that will evaluate gaps in the implementation of evidence-based treatment guidelines among chronic heart failure patients post-hospital discharge. The IMPROVE HF Bridge Study will analyze approximately 120 patients from four different centers in the United States for a period of six months following their initial hospital stay. Patients will be cared for in the outpatient setting by either a primary care physician alone, or by both a heart failure specialist and primary care physician throughout the study. The prospective, randomized study will also explore the feasibility of implementing Class I, Level A guideline recommendations set forth by the American College of Cardiology and American Heart Association. These include drug therapy (ACE inhibitors, beta-blockers), device therapy (implantable cardiac defibrillators, cardiac resynchronization therapy), heart failure education and anticoagulation for atrial fibrillation. Findings from this study will inform whether a larger trial to bridge the gap between guideline recommendations and actual practice will be initiated. Learn more at http://bit.ly/zsdBSo

NEWYORK-PRESBYTERIAN

Physicians at three transplant centers have found in a pilot study that a majority of children who receive liver tissue from a parent can eventually stop using immunosuppression (anti-rejection) medications safely. These drugs, which tamp down natural immune function, have been linked to a bevy of complications, including cancer, diabetes, hypertension and kidney failure. In the study, the researchers also found three clinical factors that appear to predict which pediatric liver transplant patients are most likely to do well if the medications are withdrawn. “These findings bring us closer to the Holy Grail of transplant medicine, which is to give a patient an organ and then taper off use of drugs that prevent rejection,” says co-author Dr. Steven J. Lobritto, associate clinical professor of pediatrics and medicine at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons and medical director of pediatric liver transplantation at NewYork-Presbyterian/Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital. Learn more at http://bit.ly/wnjH1B

ETHICON ENDO-SURGERY

For the first time, an international panel of experts has reached consensus on the best practices for performing Laparoscopic Sleeve Gastrectomy, a rapidly growing bariatric surgical procedure.The panel, made up of 25 leading bariatric surgeons, compiled the consensus statement to help the surgical community continue to improve patient outcomes, minimize complications and move toward adoption of standardized techniques. The results have been published in a paper titled “International Sleeve Gastrectomy Expert Panel Consensus Statement: Best Practice Guidelines Based on Experience of Over 12,000 Cases” in Surgery for Obesity and Related Diseases (SOARD), the official journal of the American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery. The assembly and work of the expert surgeon panel that developed the consensus was supported by an educational grant from Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc. (EES). This is part of the EES commitment to the development of science-based bariatric and metabolic solutions through collaboration with healthcare professionals to help deliver the best possible patient outcomes. Learn more at http://bit.ly/AulTDJ

UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND MEDICAL CENTER

A new comparison of the procedures to help prevent strokes by removing or relieving blockages in the arteries of the neck concludes they are equally effective at halting repeat blockage. Two years after treatment with either surgery or a minimally invasive treatment using wire coils called stents, the re-blockage rate remained the same, approximately six percent. “This was a huge surprise,” says Brajesh K. Lal, M.D., lead author and associate professor of vascular surgery at the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore. The carotid arteries on each side of the neck supply blood to the brain. Fatty material called plaque can partially or totally block blood flow through the arteries to the brain, which can result in a stroke. Carotid artery blockages cause about 10 percent of strokes. Surgery or stenting preserves blood flow and lowers the risk of stroke. Learn more at http://bit.ly/Ak4YcV

UPMC

Using an approach that combines molecular biology, genetics, cell biology and physiology, and pathology, researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute (UPCI) and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine have identified a protein that governs a key molecule involved in orchestrating the balance between tumor growth and tumor suppression. The findings reveal a regulatory pathway that could provide new targets for future cancer treatment. Kruppel-like factor 4 (KLF4) is one of four molecules known to play an important role in transforming the body’s mature cells back into stem cells, said senior author Yong Wan, Ph.D., associate professor, Department of Cell Biology, Pitt School of Medicine and UPCI. His team began studying KLF4 to better understand its biology. Learn more at http://bit.ly/zMH1qy

COVIDIEN

Covidien, a leading global provider of healthcare products, announces that the Solitaire™ FR Revascularization Device has been approved for investigational use in the Interventional Management of Stroke (IMS III) trial. The Solitaire FR device was approved by the IMS III Executive Committee in the thrombectomy arm of the trial and was included in a recently approved amendment submitted to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The IMS III Trial will compare a combined intravenous (IV) and intra-arterial (IA) treatment approach to restoring blood flow to the brain to the current standard FDA-approved treatment approach of giving IV rTPA alone. A projected 900 subjects with moderate to severe ischemic stroke will be enrolled at over 50 centers in the United States, Canada, Australia and potentially Europe. The Executive Committee approved the Solitaire FR device to ensure that the study and patients have the most advanced treatment technologies to help determine the role of endovascular therapy in acute ischemic stroke. Learn more at http://bit.ly/A2e76x