Recent studies conducted by researchers at Johns Hopkins University show that obese people have an increased risk of developing common kidney cancer, kidney stones apart from being at a high risk of getting a stroke. A study involving 1,640 participants studied the effects of weight on kidney cancer. The average age of patients was 62 and all participants had kidney tumors. The study showed that patients with a BMI of 30 or higher were 48% more likely to develop clear-cell renal cell cancer (RCC). With every 1 point increase in BMI, obese patients increased their odds of getting kidney cancer by 4%. Out of all the participants, 67% of the obese patients had kidney cancer compared to 57% of non-obese patients.

InSightec Ltd. announced that Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare (MHLW) has approved the company’s ExAblate(R) MR-guided Focused Ultrasound (MRgFUS) system for the treatment of women with uterine fibroids. ExAblate is currently the only noninvasive treatment for uterine fibroids approved for use in Japan. Approximately 25% Japanese women will develop symptomatic uterine fibroids, primarily during childbearing years. These benign tumors can significantly impair functionality and degrade quality of life resulting in significant work absences.

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Abiraterone acetate (AA) can be safely administered for long periods without concurrent steroids in patients with advanced castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC), according to research presented here at the 2nd European Multidisciplinary Meeting on Urological Cancers (EMUC). AA reduces levels of testosterone, oestradiol, and cortisol, but it increases levels of adrenocorticotropic hormone, deoxycorticosterone, and corticosterone, which could lead to hypokalaemia, hypertension, and fluid retention.

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Quark Pharmaceuticals, Inc. announced that the independent Data Safety Monitoring Board (”DSMB”) recommended that QPI-1002 (I5NP) continue on to the next phase of clinical testing. This followed review of available safety data from two clinical trials for Quark’s siRNA QPI-1002, at doses up to 10 mg/kg, the highest evaluated to date. QPI-1002 is designed to temporarily inhibit expression of the stress-response gene, p53.

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Sorafenib therapy is safe and effective, with evidence of long-lasting disease control in elderly patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC), according to research presented at the 2nd European Multidisciplinary Meeting on Urological Cancers (EMUC). On the basis of increasing incidence of RCC with age, the objective of this retrospective, subset analysis was to assess the safety and efficacy of sorafenib in patients older than 65 years of age.

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The American Urological Association (AUA)’s updated Prostate-Specific Antigen Best Practice Statement, first presented at the annual meeting of the AUA in April, was published in the November issue of the Journal of Urology. The statement includes the controversial guidance that the prostate-specific antigen (PSA) test should be offered to men starting at the age of 40 years, which one critic has said is not supported by any convincing evidence

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Drinking regular or decaffeinated coffee is associated with a reduced risk of advanced prostate cancer, new research conducted at the Channing Laboratory in Boston suggests. Men who drank the most coffee had a 59% decreased risk of either lethal or advanced prostate cancer compared with men who drank no coffee. The magnitude of risk reduction was more pronounced in men who never smoked.

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The world’s first patient to have a malignant rectal tumor removed through the anus, thus avoiding painful abdominal incisions, was a 76-year old woman who was able to leave the Barcelona hospital where she was treated, with no complications. The surgeons are optimistic that the method can now be developed to treat a range of colorectal diseases, including cancer and diverticulitis, offering patients the benefit of fewer postoperative complications and a speedier recovery.

Spectrum Pharmaceuticals has reported that one of the two Phase III pivotal clinical trials of apaziquone has achieved enrollment target, having enrolled approximately 800 patients. The second Phase III clinical trial of apaziquone is expected to complete enrollment by the end of 2009. The apaziquone registration plan calls for two double blind, randomized Phase III clinical studies, each with 562 patients with Ta G1 or G2 low risk non-invasive bladder cancer.

According to research published in the November issue of The Journal of Urology the location of the tumor in the renal pelvis compared to the ureter doesn’t predict cancer-specific mortality, in patients with upper urinary tract urothelial carcinoma (UTUC). The researchers found that patients with primary renal pelvis tumors were more likely to be female than patients with ureteral primary tumors.