A new discovery by the Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine points the way to critically impo...
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A new discovery by the Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine points the way to critically important treatment medical equipment possibilities for patients with advanced prostate cancer in whom chemotherapy and hormone therapy have failed.Patients with advanced prostate cancer who do not respond to hormone therapy, or in whom it stops working altogether, are commonly treated with docetaxel. However, that therapy commonly loses its effectiveness six to eight months into treatment, and in a significant number of patients, never works at all.Rakesh Singal, M.D., associate professor of medicine and member of the Prostate, Bladder and Kidney Cancers Site Disease Group at Sylvester, led the study and is conducting the only clinical trial surrounding the discovery. Dr. Singal has been studying methylation-mediated transcriptional regulation in prostate and other cancers. In many cancers, malignant cells are able to proliferate by shutting down the body’s natural defenses, which include apoptosis or cell death and DNA repair. Repression of genes involved in ‘apoptotic’ or ‘cell death’ pathway may result from ’DNA methylation’. DNA methylation refers to a modification of DNA without a change to the original DNA sequence, resulting in alteration in gene expression.The Sylvester Comprehensive Cancer Center and Miller School are planning a memorial tribute to William J. Harrington, Jr., M.D., professor of medicine in the Division of Hematology Oncology at the Miller School. Scores of friends, colleagues and family members gathered for a visitation at Stanfill Funeral Home Tuesday evening. A smaller, more intimate memorial service will be held Friday, February 6, at 5:30 pm at First Baptist Church of Homestead, 29050 SW 177th Avenue.Dr. Harrington, a leading authority on viral-induced cancers and co-leader of the Viral Oncology Program at Sylvester, died from a cerebral hemorrhage at the age of 54. His organs were donated to others.“It is impossible to express how much he will be missed by everyone at Sylvester and throughout the medical school and university,” said W. Jarrard Goodwin, M.D., director of Sylvester.Dr. Harrington’s research uncovered a novel approach to attacking tumors that had proved resistant to conventional chemotherapy. His team found that interferon played a role in viral-mediated lymphomas.A close colleague, Glen Barber, Ph.D, professor of medicine in the Division of Hematology Oncology and co-leader of the Viral Oncology Program with Harrington, said he “frequently obtained fantastic results that were not deemed possible.” Barber also knew him as a friend, describing him as “an adventurer and free spirit” who loved the outdoors and hiked all over the world.Over the course of his career, Dr. Harrington received multiple National Cancer Institute research awards to study and develop novel therapies for Epstein Barr-related lymphoma. He had also been collaborating with investigators in Brazil to develop new therapies against Epstein Barr-related lymphoma, and was an internationally recognized expert for his clinical work with patients with HIV who developed viral lymphomas.
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