Abstinent smokers experience increased pain sensitivity during withdrawal, to the point that they often require more pain relief after surgery. New from JNeurosci, Zhijie Lu, from Fudan University Minhang Hospital, and Kai Wei, from Shanghai Eastern Hepatobiliary Surgery Hospital, led a team of researchers to explore brain activity linking nicotine withdrawal and pain sensitivity. The researchers found that 30 abstinent smokers had altered functioning of specific brain areas, increased pain sensitivity, and a need for more postoperative pain relief-particularly with opioids-compared to 30 nonsmokers. The longer that smokers abstained from their use, the more sensitive they were to pain, which was associated with a distinct set of brain regions. Notably, this effect was constrained to a specific timeframe of abstinence, supporting previous findings that pain sensitivity may return to normal levels once abstinence exceeds 3 months. The relationship between postoperative care requirements and withdrawal symptoms from abstinence was linked to a different set of brain regions. We'd like to emphasize that our study does not discourage smokers from quitting before surgery. Our aim is to encourage researchers to delve deeper into the mechanisms underlying elevated pain sensitivity during short-term abstinence, with the goal of developing strategies to mitigate the clinical challenge of increased analgesic (especially opioid) use associated with preoperative smoking cessation." The researchers have already begun exploring the mechanisms of a postoperative pain reliever that may be more effective than opioids in abstinent smokers as well as the mechanisms and effectiveness of preoperative nicotine replacement therapies. Altered regional brain activity underlying the higher postoperative analgesic requirements in abstinent smokers: A prospective cohort study. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

Adults with chronic pain who participated in New York State's (NYS) Medical Cannabis Program were significantly less likely to require prescription opioids, according to a new study published today in JAMA Internal Medicine and led by researchers at Albert Einstein College of Medicine and Montefiore Health System. Chronic pain and opioid addiction are two of the most pressing health challenges in the United States. Our findings indicate that medical cannabis, when dispensed through a pharmacist-supervised system, can relieve chronic pain while also meaningfully reducing patients' reliance on prescription opioids. Supervised use of medical cannabis could be an important tool in combatting the opioid crisis." The study involved 204 adults who were prescribed opioids for chronic pain and were newly certified for medical cannabis between September 2018 and July 2023. Participants were tracked for 18 months, with data on both their cannabis and opioid use collected from the New York State Prescription Monitoring Program. Over the 18-month follow-up period, that average daily dose fell to 57 mg, a 22% reduction. More specifically, those participants who received a 30-day supply of medical cannabis used the equivalent of 3.5 fewer mg of morphine per day than those who received no cannabis during the same month. "Those changes may seem small, but gradual reductions in opioid use are safer and more sustainable for people managing chronic pain than stopping suddenly," Dr. Slawek noted. "We hope these findings will lead to new policies encouraging the effective management of chronic pain through use of regulated substances." Other Montefiore Einstein authors were Chenshu Zhang, Ph.D.; Yuval Zolotov, Ph.D.; Joanna L. Starrels, M.D., M.S. Medical Cannabis and Opioid Receipt Among Adults With Chronic Pain. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. To start a conversation, please log into your AZoProfile account first, or create a new account. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. Please check the box above to proceed. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

Developing new drugs is one of the riskiest and most expensive endeavors in science. Today, The Jackson Laboratory (JAX) announced a bold initiative to improve that trajectory, powered by an up to $30 million contract from the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) Computational ADME-Tox and Physiology Analysis for Safer Therapeutics (CATALYST) program. CATALYST is led by ARPA-H Health Science Futures Mission Office Acting Deputy Director Andy Kilianski, Ph.D. By building virtual, beating hearts, JAX scientists aim to dramatically reduce the need for large-animal studies, streamline FDA approval, and ensure safer, faster delivery of new therapies to patients. That would revolutionize drug development, making it far more affordable and accessible." Despite passing early safety standards, more than 90 percent of drugs fail – often due to unforeseen toxicities that emerge late in clinical trials. CARDIOVERSE tackles one of the most persistent and consequential challenges in drug development: cardiotoxicity, when potential drugs can interfere with heart function. Individuals may experience different adverse effects, which further complicates the approval process. To address this, Mahoney's team will train AI algorithms using data from mice and human cells that replicate human heart function in a dish and capture the genetic variability present across patient populations. JAX is a world leader in mouse studies and the use of human stem cells, and with its recent acquisition of the New York Stem Cell Foundation (NYSCF), the team will profile these cellular models at an unprecedented scale using cutting-edge robotic automation. This data will power AI models that go beyond safety predictions. They will uncover how genetic differences control individual responses to treatment, offering a more complete picture of cardiotoxicity across patient populations. "Too many promising medicines never reach patients because we can't predict early enough who they will help and who they might harm," said Lon Cardon, JAX president and CEO. "With CARDIOVERSE, we're building virtual hearts that more accurately reflect the broad genetic backgrounds of real people. This means we can identify which drugs are safe and effective for certain patients, and which may not be, so every person has a better chance of receiving the treatment that's right for them." They will study gene activity and metabolic changes following drug exposure-insights that could reveal biomarkers and genetic risk factors that make certain populations more vulnerable to toxicity. Using mice and human cells that represent a broad range of genetic profiles, they will generate the critical data needed to train AI models, creating a powerful tool to make cardiotoxicity predictions more accurate than ever before. "Our AI model will show a population of virtual hearts, each one beating and responding differently to the same drug," Mahoney said. "That range of responses lets us capture cardiotoxicity outcomes across wide patient groups, identifying what fraction of the population may be at risk and uncovering potential biomarkers for that risk." This knowledge could improve patient stratification in clinical trials and give companies greater confidence in advancing drugs to later stages, enabling safer, more precise decisions about which therapies should move forward. By simulating hundreds or thousands of virtual hearts across different genetic backgrounds, CARDIOVERSE will identify those rare but serious reactions before human trials begin. "That would take an expensive experiment off the table and allow more drug candidates from lean startups that are not well capitalized to get to human trials. Project co-leads include JAX scientists Nadia Rosenthal, recognized for her expertise in high-resolution imaging of tiny mouse hearts; Paul Robson, a stem cell biology expert and a lead developer of the genetically varied human iPSC panel; and Travis Hinson, a cardiologist whose lab investigates inherited conditions leading to heart failure. They are joined by Daniel Paull of NYSCF, a pioneer in high-throughput automation for generating iPSCs at scale and overseer of the Global Stem Cell Array®. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

Huntsman Cancer Institute at the University of Utah (the U) participated in a clinical trial that found that a new combination treatment plan helped people with recurring grade 3 astrocytoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer, live longer. Astrocytoma is an extremely challenging diagnosis for both patients and physicians, as the range of treatments and efficacy is limited. All patients had to have previously received radiation and chemotherapy, as well as had recurrence of the disease after treatment. The study initially enrolled patients who had a type of brain tumor called anaplastic astrocytoma. But as medical definitions changed, the study ended up including three types of brain tumors: glioblastoma, grade 3 IDH-mutant astrocytoma, and grade 4 IDH-mutant astrocytoma. Glioblastoma is a different type of astrocytoma that is more aggressive and does not involve mutations in the IDH gene. There was also no benefit of eflornithine for patients with grade 4 IDH-mutant astrocytomas or glioblastoma. But for patients with grade 3 IDH-mutant astrocytoma, the new treatment helped them live much longer-about 35 months compared to 24 months with the standard treatment. Colman and his team also considered the progression-free survival rates of each group, which measure how long it takes for a patient's disease to worsen after starting treatment. For patients with grade 4 IDH-mutant astrocytoma or glioblastoma, there was no significant improvement. But, as in overall survival rates, patients with grade 3 IDH-mutant astrocytoma on the combination therapy fared better. Patients taking lomustine alone had a median progression-free survival rate of 7.2 months. In patients taking the combination therapy of lomustine and eflornithine, the median was more than twice as long, at 15.8 months. Advances in treating brain tumors are critical to overcoming this difficult diagnosis for Huntsman Cancer Institute's patients and patients throughout the country," says Neli Ulrich, PhD, MS, chief scientific officer and executive director of the Comprehensive Cancer Center at Huntsman Cancer Institute and Jon M. and Karen Huntsman Presidential Professor in Cancer Research in the Department of Population Health Sciences at the U. "With every breakthrough in the treatment of astrocytoma, we move closer to transforming uncertainty into hope. Through federally funded cancer research and strong public–private partnerships, we are accelerating scientific discovery and bringing new, powerful treatments to the patients who need them most." Huntsman Cancer Institute at the University of Utah Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

Lab Thread Ltd, a UK-based life science software company, today announced the beta launch of its flagship unified lab software platform. Lab Thread is uniquely designed to provide an intuitive and adoptable platform with powerful collaborative features - helping to unite researchers, lab operations and scientific data from across diverse teams and advance scientific discovery. The platform combines a range of modules regularly used by scientists, including project management, DNA engineering, sample recording and tracking, a laboratory notebook, experimental data management and robust chat functions. The platform also offers broad compatibility with other lab software, enabling teams to easily integrate the platform into their own lab and process - enabling true cross-collaboration in real time. The platform also leverages AI-based systems for enhanced search functionalities, with an extensive developmental roadmap in place to integrate further AI features alongside other new functionalities to the platform, including: The development of the Lab Thread platform has been supported through a combination of funding from the Company's founding team, as well as Mercia Asset Management, who provided $1 m funding in June 2025. The Lab Thread platform is an elegant, all-in-one software solution for biological research labs, providing powerful collaborative tools across data management, analysis and DNA engineering. This launch culminates an intensive development process, particularly over the past six months as we have worked to deliver the beta on schedule, and I'm extremely proud and thankful to our dedicated team for making this possible." Interested parties may sign up via the Lab Thread website. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

The research analyzed walking speeds of 1,110 adults aged 65 and over from two major UK trials. Their average walking speed was 0.77 meters per second, well below the 1.2 m/s assumed by most pedestrian crossing designs. This means the average participant would take 6.5 seconds to cross a 5-metre road – over two seconds more than the green crossing signal typically allows. Current crossing times might be unrealistic for many older people who face challenges with their mobility. This isn't just a safety issue – it's potentially a barrier to independence, physical activity, and social connection, all of which often decline in later life." Dr. Max Western, University of Bath Centre for Motivation and Behaviour Change The study also found that older age, lower strength and balance were associated with slower walking speeds. Designing outdoor spaces that work for everyone – such as allowing enough time to cross the road – can boost confidence, support independence, and help them remain engaged in their communities - all key to a better quality of life." The researchers argue that even small changes, such as extending green signal times by a few seconds, could make a big difference. They propose adjusting crossing times to reflect a more realistic walking speed of 0.7 m/s, which would allow more people to cross safely and confidently. While innovations like smart crossings and countdown timers are emerging, the team warns that without targeted public awareness and inclusive design, these technologies may not benefit those most in need. The adoption of urban design standards that account for slower walking speeds by extending crossing times and improving pedestrian safety features. This ensures older adults can move confidently and remain active in their communities. The integration of mobility support into public health strategies by creating age-friendly outdoor spaces such as safe walkways, benches, and extended crossing times to encourage regular physical activity among older adults Gait speed in community-dwelling older adults with mobility limitations relative to pedestrian crossing times, is published in Age and Ageing today, Monday 8 December (DOI: 10.1093/ageing/afaf345). The research paper presents a secondary analysis of data collected as part of two NIHR Public Health Research Programme grants (reference: 13/164/51 and 130156). Gait speed in community-dwelling older adults with mobility limitations relative to pedestrian crossing times. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

Children who spend a significant amount of time on social media tend to experience a gradual decline in their ability to concentrate. This is according to a comprehensive study from Karolinska Institutet, published in Pediatrics Open Science, where researchers followed more than 8,000 children from around age 10 through age 14. Researchers at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden and Oregon Health & Science University in the USA have now investigated a possible link between screen habits and ADHD-related symptoms.The study followed 8,324 children aged 9-10 in the USA for four years, with the children reporting how much time they spent on social media, watching TV/videos and playing video games, and their parents assessing their levels of attention and hyperactivity/impulsiveness. Children who spent a significant amount of time on social media platforms, such as Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, Facebook, Twitter or Messenger, gradually developed inattention symptoms; there was no such association, however, for watching television or playing video games. Social media entails constant distractions in the form of messages and notifications, and the mere thought of whether a message has arrived can act as a mental distraction. The association was not influenced by socioeconomic background or a genetic predisposition towards ADHD. Additionally, children who already had symptoms of inattentiveness did not start to use social media more, which suggests that the association leads from use to symptoms and not vice versa.The researchers found no increase in hyperactive/impulsive behaviour. "Greater consumption of social media might explain part of the increase we're seeing in ADHD diagnoses, even if ADHD is also associated with hyperactivity, which didn't increase in our study," says Professor Klingberg. The researchers stress that the results do not imply that all children who use social media develop concentration difficulties, but there is reason to discuss age limits and platform design. In the study, the average time spent on social media rose from approximately 30 minutes a day for 9-year-olds to 2.5 hours for 13-year-olds, despite the fact that many platforms set their minimum age requirement at 13. "We hope that our findings will help parents and policymakers make well-informed decisions on healthy digital consumption that support children's cognitive development," says the study's first author Samson Nivins, postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Women's and Children's Health, Karolinska Institutet.The researchers now plan to follow the children after the age of 14 to see if this association holds.The study was financed by the Swedish Research Council and the Masonic Home for Children in Stockholm Foundation. Digital Media, Genetics and Risk for ADHD Symptoms in Children – A Longitudinal Study. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. Please check the box above to proceed. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

According to a new study, lower doses of approved immunotherapy for malignant melanoma can give better results against tumors, while reducing side effects. The results are highly interesting in oncology, as we show that a lower dose of an immunotherapy drug, in addition to causing significantly fewer side effects, actually gives better results against tumors and longer survival." The traditional dose of nivolumab and ipilimumab is the one that is approved and established. Due to the extensive side effects, Sweden has increasingly begun to use a treatment regimen with a lower dose of ipilimumab, which is the most expensive part of this immunotherapy and causes the most side effects. "In Sweden, we have greater freedom to choose doses for patients, while in many other countries, due to reimbursement policies, they are restricted by the doses approved by the drug authorities," says Hildur Helgadottir. The study included nearly 400 patients with advanced, inoperable malignant melanoma, the most serious form of skin cancer. "The new immunotherapies are very valuable and effective, but at the same time they can cause serious side effects that are sometimes life-threatening or chronic. Our results suggest that this lower dosage may enable more patients to continue the treatment for a longer time, which is likely to contribute to the improved results and longer survival," says Hildur Helgadottir. There were some differences between the two treatment groups, but even after adjusting for several factors such as age and tumor stage, the better outcome for the lower dose of ipilimumab remained. The study is a retrospective observational study and therefore it is not possible to definitively establish a causal relationship. Evaluation of the flipped dose NIVO3+IPI1 in patients with advanced unresectable melanoma. JNCI: Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. To start a conversation, please log into your AZoProfile account first, or create a new account. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. Please check the box above to proceed. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

A shoebox-sized optical device reads glucose directly through the skin in seconds, offering a promising step toward truly noninvasive, point-of-care glucose monitoring. Pipeline for the development of compact BRS-based CGM. (c) Scheme of the optical system for BRS. HS: heat sink; TEC: temperature control; D-M: D-shaped mirror; BB: beam blocker; LLF: laser line filter; AD: achromatic doublet; LPF: long-pass filter; BPF: band-pass filter; APD: amplified photodiode; PD: photodiode (d) Simulated Raman spectra around the Raman peak of glucose at 1125 cm–1 through 11 glucose levels. Shear areas indicate the chosen bands for BRS. A recent study published in the journal Analytical Chemistry reports that Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) researchers developed a noninvasive, light-based device that can accurately measure blood glucose levels in under a minute. Diabetes, a chronic metabolic condition characterized by elevated blood glucose levels, has become a significant public health crisis globally, with projections indicating 592 million cases by 2035. The traditional finger-pricking method has long been the standard approach, using lancets and test strips to measure capillary blood glucose. However, using this method every day, multiple times a day, is impractical for continuous glucose monitoring, leading to under-testing and an increased risk of severe health complications in people with diabetes. Several wearable devices have also been developed for continuous glucose monitoring through sensors implanted just under the skin. To overcome these limitations, several noninvasive methods have been developed, including vibrational spectroscopy that directly targets the molecular signatures of glucose, and photothermal and photoacoustic spectroscopy that analyze thermal or acoustic changes in tissue properties induced by glucose absorption. Some indirect methods, such as photoplethysmography and breath analysis, have also emerged to monitor glucose levels by measuring secondary physiological effects or byproducts of glucose metabolism. To address these challenges, MIT researchers developed a compact, noninvasive, portable sensor based on Raman spectroscopy using a band-pass Raman spectroscopy (BRS) approach for continuous glucose monitoring. Raman spectroscopy is a technique that shines near-infrared or visible light on tissues or cells to reveal their chemical compositions. The researchers developed this Raman-based system to efficiently and accurately quantify glucose levels through optimized optics and physically interpretable spectral metrics. The system was mounted on breadboards and enclosed, resulting in a compact, portable glucose-monitoring device capable of directly measuring glucose Raman signals from the skin. The glucose Raman signals, which were generated through near-infrared (830 nm) light, are generally too small to be easily distinguished from all other signals generated by cellular or tissue molecules. To filter out these unwanted signals, researchers shone near-infrared light onto the skin at an angle different from that used to collect the resulting Raman signal. This off-axis configuration suppresses elastically scattered light and enhances glucose-specific Raman features. A Raman spectrum typically contains approximately 1,000 bands, which are spectral regions that correspond to specific molecular features. Among these bands, the researchers selected and analyzed only three strategically chosen spectral bands around the main glucose Raman peak, using two adjacent sidebands as intraspectrum references to measure blood glucose levels. This approach allowed them to measure with a cost-effective device about the size of a shoebox, without requiring full-spectrum acquisition or complex AI-driven models. The researchers conducted initial validation experiments using optical tissue phantoms across a wide range of glucose concentrations, followed by a pilot intraskin study to investigate the efficiency of this Raman-based portable system in continuously monitoring blood glucose levels in a human participant. The measurements were taken every five minutes over a period of four hours. For a comparative analysis, two commercially available, invasive continuous glucose monitors were inserted into the participant's other arm to measure glucose levels every 5 minutes. A one-finger-prick standard glucometer was also used to measure blood glucose levels every 10 minutes. To induce dynamic changes in blood glucose concentrations, the participant was instructed to drink two 75-gram glucose drinks during the trial. The final trial findings indicated that measurements from the Raman-based device closely tracked glucose trends and agreed with those from commercial invasive devices, with performance metrics comparable to those of current commercial continuous glucose monitors. The portable, noninvasive Raman-based device developed in the study demonstrates promising preliminary performance for continuous monitoring of blood glucose levels, with measurement accuracy comparable to that of commercially available invasive glucose monitors in this pilot setting. The device takes approximately 36 seconds to complete a measurement, resulting in a total measurement time of under one minute. While the current findings are based on a single healthy participant, these preliminary observations provide a strong basis for future studies with larger, more diverse populations, including people with diabetes, to better understand the potential of this point-of-care technology. The device shows promise in transforming glucose monitoring, offering portability, accessibility, accuracy, and continuity for future clinical and personal health management applications, with the potential to reduce reliance on finger-prick testing and under-the-skin sensors over time. Dr. Sanchari Sinha Dutta is a science communicator who believes in spreading the power of science in every corner of the world. Following her Master's degree, Sanchari went on to study a Ph.D. in human physiology. She has authored more than 10 original research articles, all of which have been published in world renowned international journals. Please use one of the following formats to cite this article in your essay, paper or report: Noninvasive Raman device tracks blood glucose accurately in under a minute. "Noninvasive Raman device tracks blood glucose accurately in under a minute". "Noninvasive Raman device tracks blood glucose accurately in under a minute". Noninvasive Raman device tracks blood glucose accurately in under a minute. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

A nationwide analysis of prescription data reveals that young Australians are staying on antidepressants for longer than ever, highlighting growing gaps between clinical guidelines and real-world practice. Increasing Prevalence of Long-Term Antidepressant Use in Australia: A Retrospective Observational Study. A recent study published in the journal Pharmacoepidemiology and Drug Safety highlights a steadily increasing prevalence of long-term antidepressant use in Australia, especially among adolescents and young adults aged 10 to 24 years. Antidepressants are widely prescribed medications for the treatment of various mental health conditions, including depression, anxiety, and panic disorder. However, clinical evidence indicates that a significant proportion of antidepressant prescriptions do not align with the officially approved therapeutic uses. For high-risk patients, therapy duration can be extended to reduce the risk of relapse. However, a growing trend in antidepressant therapy for more than one year or longer has been observed in many countries, including the United Kingdom, Italy, and Sweden. In Australia, a continuous long-term use of antidepressants has been observed among users even in the absence of clearly documented clinical indications. Given the potential negative consequences associated with long-term antidepressant use and the limited evidence describing national long-term utilisation patterns, University of South Australia researchers conducted an epidemiological study to understand the trends in long-term antidepressant use in Australia between 2014 and 2023. The researchers analyzed a 10% population-based sample of patients from the Australian Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS), which included a complete record of PBS-subsidised antidepressant dispensings for individuals aged 10 years and above, excluding most inpatient hospital medicines and private prescriptions. The study analysis revealed that the prevalence of antidepressant use had increased from 107.7 per 1000 population in 2014 to 128.8 per 1000 population in 2023, with a notable acceleration during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic period. The annual proportion of new users rose from 29.4 per 1000 population in 2014 to a peak of 32.4 per 1000 population in 2021, before declining back to 29.4 per 1000 population in 2023. The proportion of new users relative to prevalent users gradually declined over time, with the lowest percentage observed in 2023. Regarding long-term antidepressant use, the study found an overall increase from 66.1 per 1000 population in 2014 to approximately 85 per 1000 population by 2022, with a small decline to 84.6 per 1000 population in 2023. The analysis by gender revealed a consistently higher prevalence among female users during the entire study period. However, the highest increase in duration was observed in the 10–24 years age group, which was a 56% increase between 2014 and 2023. Long-term use was defined as continuous antidepressant treatment for at least 365 days, allowing short gaps between dispensings. The percentage of long-term users with apparent dose reductions showed minimal change over time. These dose reductions were identified using dispensing-based metrics and may not always reflect intentional clinical deprescribing. The study highlights an increasing trend in long-term antidepressant use across all age groups in Australia, particularly among patients aged 10–24 years. A similar increasing trend in treatment duration has been observed, which is accompanied by limited efforts in apparent dose reduction. According to the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists (RANZCP) Clinical Practice Guidelines published in 2015, 2017, and 2021, antidepressant therapy should be continued for 6–12 months after symptom remission. The guidelines also recommend extending treatment duration for patients with recurrent depressive disorder. Despite these guidelines, this study finds a significant increase in long-term antidepressant use and treatment duration and a reluctance to deprescribe. These observations raise vital concerns about potential over-prescription, difficulty in withdrawing from therapy, and suboptimal deprescribing practices. An exponential rise in social media use in the last decade and its negative influence on mental health may have contributed to the observed trend. Furthermore, social isolation and movement restrictions imposed during the COVID-19 pandemic may also have adversely affected mental health in young people. The expansion of healthcare services, particularly telemedicine, has improved access to mental health care among young people. Although encouraging the youth to seek medical help more proactively, these services may also contribute to unnecessary initiation of pharmacological interventions, suboptimal deprescribing practices, and the overprescription of antidepressants. These adversities in clinical practice should be addressed by promoting current guidelines that recommend psychological strategies, such as cognitive behavioral therapy, as first-line and primary treatments for young people with mental health conditions, with pharmacological therapy reserved for selected cases or used as adjunctive treatment. Dr. Sanchari Sinha Dutta is a science communicator who believes in spreading the power of science in every corner of the world. Following her Master's degree, Sanchari went on to study a Ph.D. in human physiology. She has authored more than 10 original research articles, all of which have been published in world renowned international journals. Please use one of the following formats to cite this article in your essay, paper or report: Young Australians are staying on antidepressants for longer than ever. "Young Australians are staying on antidepressants for longer than ever". "Young Australians are staying on antidepressants for longer than ever". Young Australians are staying on antidepressants for longer than ever. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. 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Researchers say the findings offer reassurance that chemotherapy can be omitted without detrimental effects and suggest that a chemo-free targeted agent and immunotherapy combination could become the new standard of care for this patient group. The significance was very impressive, a more than 20% difference in terms of molecular response achievement [a sensitive test for residual cancer cells following treatment], so this approach truly is better." Sabina Chiaretti, MD, lead study author, associate professor, Sapienza University, Rome, Italy ALL is a fast-growing type of leukemia affecting white blood cells, while Ph+ ALL is a genetic subtype characterized by the causal genetic abnormality in the Philadelphia chromosome. Patients with Ph+ ALL have historically faced a poor prognosis and increased resistance to chemotherapy, pointing to a need for improved treatments. In recent years, targeted tyrosine kinase inhibitors (TKIs) and immunotherapies have brought promising results, with good efficacy and fewer side effects than chemotherapy. Researchers have sought to identify the optimal combination of therapies among TKIs, immunotherapies, and chemotherapy. For the trial, researchers enrolled 236 adult patients with Ph+ ALL, ranging in age from 19 to 84 years. Two-thirds of participants were randomly assigned to the experimental arm and received a TKI plus immunotherapy; one-third were assigned to the control arm and received a TKI plus chemotherapy. Patients in the control group received the TKI imatinib along with either four or six cycles of chemotherapy for patients older or younger than age 65, respectively. The chemo-free treatment regimen also resulted in a higher rate of negative measurable residual disease (MRD) status, an indicator that all or nearly all cancer cells have been eradicated. While only 49% of those in the control group achieved MRD-negative status, 71% of those in the experimental group achieved MRD-negative status after two cycles of blinatumomab, and 80% reached this status after five cycles. "This suggests that patients really should receive the planned five cycles. This is important because we have been working with blinatumomab for years, but we did not yet know how many cycles should be recommended." About 37% of patients in the control arm eventually received the experimental treatment regimen, and 62% of these patients subsequently achieved MRD-negative status. Most of the deaths occurred in older patients, and infections were a primary cause of death among those that occurred in the experimental arm. The safety profiles were consistent with those expected for each therapy involved in the study, and researchers said that most adverse events were successfully addressed by reducing dosage. She added that a chemo-free treatment approach can bring economic benefits by reducing the need for hospitalization and allowing patients to continue working while undergoing cancer treatment. A separate study is now underway to determine whether patients with sustained MRD-negative status can discontinue TKI treatment without raising the risk of a relapse. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

Patients undergoing treatment for lymphoma often experience adverse side effects that can be so severe that they stop or slow treatment. "A lot of the work that has been done in the area of lifestyle and oncology has been in the prevention setting or in the survivorship setting after treatment," said Lopez, who explained that there is a significant lack of data on how lifestyle during treatment may impact treatment outcomes. For the trial, the research team-led by Tracy Crane, Ph.D., RDN, co-lead of the Cancer Control Program and director of lifestyle medicine, prevention and digital health at Sylvester, and Craig Moskowitz, M.D., Sylvester director of academic clinician development-72 individuals were recruited and received standard, six-cycle combination chemotherapy regimens for lymphoma. "Our goal with LIFE-L is to show that lifestyle interventions aren't just for prevention or post-treatment-they can make a real difference during treatment. If we can help patients feel stronger and reduce side effects, we're not only improving quality of life, we're supporting them in completing all of their prescribed therapy, which is critical for outcomes," said Crane. Forty-four of those patients received immediate access to a virtual diet and exercise program designed to help them maintain their fitness and reduce the burden of side effects so that they can tolerate their prescribed cancer treatment regimen. The program included weekly online coaching sessions with a registered dietitian and an exercise physiologist throughout chemotherapy. The sessions were individualized to each patient's needs. We had to ask, 'Could patients do this while they're receiving treatment?' We can offer it all day long, but are people going to want to be a part of it? Those in the intervention group reported lower rates of various symptoms, including anxiety (17% vs. 34% for the waitlist group), depression (46% vs. 67%), pain (22% vs. 39%), fatigue (46% vs. 67%), and constipation (17% vs. 25%). Additionally, participants in the program demonstrated greater grip strength and outperformed waitlisted individuals on a series of physical performance tests. As the study progresses, the team will assess whether reducing treatment burden improves participants' adherence to their treatment plans. This is vital, as it's well-known that interruptions due to side effects can diminish the effectiveness of cancer therapies. "We know that if patients receive less than 85% of their prescribed chemotherapy, there are implications for survival," said Lopez. Lopez hopes that presenting the LIFE-L findings at ASH will encourage more clinicians to refer their patients to lifestyle medicine programs. She aims to highlight the importance of diet and exercise to hematologist-oncologists, as there is often a lack of knowledge or awareness about available recommendations for patients. The virtual program is designed to help bridge this gap. "The physicians are key stakeholders in all of this." Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

By directly measuring vitamin C inside human skin, researchers show that diet can boost skin vitamin C content and influence skin structure, while also revealing clear limits to its effects on collagen formation and UV protection. Letter to the Editor: Improved Human Skin Vitamin C Levels and Skin Function after Dietary Intake of Kiwifruit: A High-Vitamin-C Food. Vitamin C (ascorbic acid) is widely promoted for supporting collagen production and skin health, yet little is known about how oral intake changes dermal or epidermal ascorbate concentrations. A new study in the Journal of Investigative Dermatology directly examines how skin compartments respond to dietary ascorbate and whether these changes translate into measurable improvements in skin function. As an antioxidant, ascorbate neutralizes ultraviolet-induced free radicals, protects against oxidative stress, and stimulates both fibroblast collagen synthesis and keratinocyte proliferation, processes central to skin thickness and anti-aging benefits. Topical products must stabilize dissolved ascorbate and deliver it across the stratum corneum, an effective barrier that complicates absorption. Systemically, the skin relies on sodium-dependent vitamin C cotransporters (SVCT1/SVCT2) to actively import circulating ascorbate. Prior research has offered almost no data on dermal vs. epidermal ascorbate content or on functional consequences of dietary supplementation. Researchers quantified ascorbate concentrations in dermis, epidermis, and whole skin from healthy adults. They also conducted a pilot dietary intervention using kiwifruit, providing ~250 mg/day of vitamin C, to test whether increasing plasma ascorbate levels elevate skin ascorbate content and alter skin function outcomes. Using per-cell measurements of DNA content, investigators found that the epidermis had 11-fold more DNA than the dermis, enabling cellular-level concentration estimates. High dermal ascorbate parallels levels in adrenal and brain tissue, where ascorbate acts as an enzymatic cofactor, likely supporting robust collagen synthesis in fibroblasts. In the kiwifruit supplementation cohort, participants with below-average baseline levels achieved plasma saturation (>60 μM), accompanied by higher dermal ascorbate in biopsy samples. At a second study site, suction-blister sampling showed that increases in plasma ascorbate were mirrored in blister fluid and epidermal blister-roof tissue, confirming active epidermal uptake via SVCT transporters. Kiwifruit supplementation increased skin density from ~0.15 to ~0.23 scanner units, an indicator of greater dermal structural protein content. However, skin elasticity declined by a small (~7%) amount, and UVA-induced oxidative stress protection did not improve. Procollagen type I peptides in blister fluid also did not increase, suggesting that changes in collagen synthesis may be subtle or not captured by this biomarker, despite rising skin density. Findings suggest that dietary vitamin C effectively elevates ascorbate levels across all skin compartments through active transport mechanisms. The authors conclude: “Increasing dietary ascorbate intake will result in effective uptake into all skin compartments and will benefit skin function.” Dr. Liji Thomas is an OB-GYN, who graduated from the Government Medical College, University of Calicut, Kerala, in 2001. She has counseled hundreds of patients facing issues from pregnancy-related problems and infertility, and has been in charge of over 2,000 deliveries, striving always to achieve a normal delivery rather than operative. Please use one of the following formats to cite this article in your essay, paper or report: Kiwifruit intake boosts vitamin C in skin and supports dermal structure. "Kiwifruit intake boosts vitamin C in skin and supports dermal structure". "Kiwifruit intake boosts vitamin C in skin and supports dermal structure". Kiwifruit intake boosts vitamin C in skin and supports dermal structure. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. To start a conversation, please log into your AZoProfile account first, or create a new account. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. Please check the box above to proceed. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. 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Pirtobrutinib, a non-covalent Bruton tyrosine kinase (BTK) inhibitor, met the primary endpoint for non-inferiority in terms of overall response rate in the first head-to-head comparison with ibrutinib, a covalent BTK inhibitor. Based on the study results, researchers suggest pirtobrutinib shows promise as initial BTK inhibitor therapy, including in the frontline setting, for patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) and small lymphocytic lymphoma (SLL). This study is the first phase III clinical trial to directly compare a non-covalent BTK inhibitor to a covalent BTK inhibitor in patients with CLL or SLL. It included patients who had not received any previous treatment, a first for any phase III study directly comparing BTK inhibitors, as well as patients who had their cancer come back (relapse) or not respond (refractory) after receiving treatments other than a covalent BTK inhibitor. "Pirtobrutinib was clearly non-inferior to ibrutinib, and the response rate actually favors pirtobrutinib in the total cohort," said lead study author Jennifer Woyach, MD, Bertha Bouroncle, MD, and Andrew Pereny, chair of medicine at The Ohio State University College of Medicine. "This shows that pirtobrutinib is a reasonable choice in both the treatment-naive and relapsed/refractory settings." lead study author Jennifer Woyach, MD, Bertha Bouroncle, MD, and Andrew Pereny, chair of medicine at The Ohio State University College of Medicine CLL and SLL are slow-growing forms of non-Hodgkin lymphoma that develop when lymphocytes grow out of control and abnormal B cells build up in bone marrow (CLL) or lymph nodes (SLL). Of these, 225 had not received any prior treatments, and 437 were R/R to prior treatments and had not received any BTK inhibitors. Participants were randomly assigned to receive either pirtobrutinib or ibrutinib and remain on their assigned therapy unless their disease progressed or they experienced unacceptable side effects. The results consistently favored pirtobrutinib across the majority of subgroups, including those who were treatment-naive, relapsed/refractory (R/R) to prior treatments, and those with various high-risk disease characteristics. Survival without disease progression, the study's secondary endpoint, will be formally assessed at a later time. Early results suggest that pirtobrutinib may offer some benefit over ibrutinib for this endpoint as well, showing 18-month progression-free survival (PFS) rates of 86.9% in the pirtobrutinib arm and 82.3% in the ibrutinib arm. Preliminary results suggest treatment-naive participants saw the most pronounced benefit for this endpoint. That's really important, because given the safety of pirtobrutinib, it suggests that this might be a good option in the future for some patients with frontline CLL/SLL." However, those receiving pirtobrutinib experienced lower rates of AE-related dose reductions, treatment discontinuation due to progressive disease, and certain cardiovascular AEs including hypertension and development of atrial fibrillation or flutter. These results may indicate pirtobrutinib is especially suitable for use in older or more frail patients. "While the efficacy and safety of pirtobrutinib have been very clearly established when given after a covalent BTK inhibitor, there are likely going to be subgroups of patients where pirtobrutinib is a more attractive option instead of the covalent BTK inhibitors," said Dr. Woyach. In addition to continuing to track outcomes from this study, Dr. Woyach said that future clinical trials could help refine the use of pirtobrutinib alone or in combination with other therapies as a frontline treatment. This study was funded by Eli Lilly and Company, maker of pirtobrutinib. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

The azacitidine–venetoclax combination (known as aza-ven) is the standard of care for older adults who are not fit enough for intensive chemotherapy. Our study met its primary endpoint, demonstrating that aza-ven improves event-free survival. It also leads to higher rates of overall response and composite complete response than intensive induction chemotherapy in younger, intensive-chemotherapy-eligible patients. A greater proportion of patients successfully proceeded to transplant following response with less early mortality, significantly improved quality of life during initial treatment, and less time in the hospital." Amir Fathi, MD, lead study author, director of the Center for Leukemia at Mass General Brigham Cancer Institute and associate professor of medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston Hematopoietic stem cell transplantation can cure AML, but this option is not available to everyone, and almost all patients must undergo initial treatments to reduce cancer in the bone marrow before proceeding to transplant. In the trial, 172 adult patients were randomly assigned to receive either aza-ven or standard intensive induction chemotherapy. With a median follow-up of just under 22 months, EFS was significantly longer in the aza-ven arm; the median EFS was more than 14 months among those receiving aza-ven compared with a median of just over six months for those receiving induction chemotherapy. The effect of aza-ven remained protective even after adjusting for other variables, and at one year, 53% of those in the aza-ven arm met criteria for EFS compared with 36% of those in the control arm. Patients whose cancer had certain characteristics, including core binding factor fusions, FLT3 mutations, or NPM1 mutations (unless age 60 or over), were excluded from the trial. As a result, the study reflects a patient population of predominantly intermediate-to-high-risk AML, although all patients were fit enough to undergo intensive induction chemotherapy. Participants receiving aza-ven experienced a higher overall response to treatment than those receiving induction chemotherapy, with 88% of those in the aza-ven arm seeing an overall response and 78% seeing a composite complete response, compared with 62% and 54% in the control arm, respectively. They were also more likely to progress to a transplant, which occurred in 61% of those receiving aza-ven and 40% of those receiving induction chemotherapy. The rate of grade 3 or 4 therapy-related adverse events was similar between study arms. Hospitalization was also longer among patients in the control group. Patients in the aza-ven arm also reported a lower symptom burden and lower rates of depression at two weeks, according to quality of life assessments. The researchers plan to conduct further analyses to compare costs, the rate of infectious complications, and other factors that may inform treatment decisions for this patient population. In addition, they will assess the use of measurable residual disease status to provide key prognostic and predictive information across arms of the study and inform the optimal amount of treatment needed for aza-ven prior to transplant. The study was investigator-initiatied; Genentech and AbbVie Inc. (maker of venetoclax), provided the study drug and funding to support research staff. Amir Fathi, MD, of Mass General Brigham Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School will present this study on Sunday, December 7, 2025, at 3:45 p.m. Eastern time during the Plenary Scientific Session in West Hall D2 of the Orange County Convention Center. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.

In a new trial, patients with follicular lymphoma had a significantly higher response to treatment and a nearly 80% reduction in the risk of death or disease progression if they received epcoritamab in addition to the standard second-line regimen versus the standard regimen alone. The study is the first reported randomized controlled trial to test a bispecific antibody combination in follicular lymphoma and suggests the combination could offer an effective alternative to chemotherapy that can be safely administered on an outpatient basis. Based on the study results, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved epcoritamab with rituximab and lenalidomide for relapsed or refractory follicular lymphoma in November 2025. We are at a point in time when chemo-free approaches based on immunotherapy can seriously challenge chemotherapy as the standard of care. Lorenzo Falchi, MD, lead study author, assistant attending physician in the lymphoma service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York Patients who see their cancer return after an initial round of treatment have limited options and often experience subsequent relapses. The immunotherapeutic combination rituximab and lenalidomide (known as R2) has become a standard second-line treatment for follicular lymphoma, while epcoritamab, a bispecific antibody, was more recently approved for follicular lymphoma that is relapsed or refractory (R/R) after two or more lines of systemic therapy. R2 and epcoritamab operate through different mechanisms to enhance the ability of a patient's immune system to recognize and eradicate cancer cells. At a median follow-up of just under 15 months, the group receiving epcoritamab plus R2 showed a significantly higher overall response rate (95.1% versus 79.2% among the control group) and a significantly longer progression-free survival (85.5% versus 40.2% at 16 months), meeting both of the trial's primary endpoints. Epcoritamab plus R2 also outperformed R2 alone for the trial's secondary endpoints, with 82.7% of patients in this arm seeing a complete response (CR) to treatment versus 49.8% among those who received R2 alone. Participants who received epcoritamab plus R2 also showed a significantly longer duration of response and CR. The results were consistent across all subgroups analyzed. Additionally, researchers noted that very few patients who received epcoritamab required subsequent treatments during the study period, suggesting that the new regimen can help patients avoid or delay further treatments and their associated toxicities. At 16 months, 92.8% of patients in this group remained free from new anti-lymphoma treatments, compared with 64.9% among those who received R2 alone. Participants who received epcoritamab plus R2 experienced a higher rate of adverse events, with grade 3 or 4 treatment-related adverse events occurring in 90.1% of patients receiving epcoritamab and 67.6% of patients in the control group. This increase was driven largely by a higher rate of low white blood cell counts and infections among those receiving epcoritamab. "There has been some hesitancy to use bispecific antibodies in a community setting because of CRS," said Dr. Falchi. The study also tested two different step-up dosing regimens for the epcoritamab–R2 combination, showing that three initial smaller doses resulted in a reduced rate of low-grade CRS compared with a course of just two initial smaller doses. The study was funded by Genmab and AbbVie Inc. Lorenzo Falchi, MD, of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, will present this study on Sunday, December 7, 2025, at 10:15 a.m. Eastern time in West Hall D2 of the Orange County Convention Center. Discover how real-time cell density monitoring boosts yield, lowers media costs, and improves viability in bioprocessing. Discover how electron microscopy advances plant and microbial research with expert insights from the John Innes Centre's bioimaging facility. Discover how Abselion's Amperia™ platform delivers fast, reproducible His-tagged protein quantification with minimal prep, even from crude lysates. News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance with these terms and conditions. Please note that medical information found on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide. Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net. Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content. A few things you need to know before we start. While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses. Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or authors. Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their privacy principles. Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential information.