(This is an excerpt of the Health Rounds newsletter, where we present latest medical studies on Tuesdays and Thursdays.)
By Nancy Lapid
July 31 (Reuters) – We also report a new and improved way of monitoring Parkinson’s disease medication levels.
IMMUNOTHERAPY CAN PREVENT BLADDER REMOVAL FOR CANCER
A new immunotherapy helped many patients with an aggressive form of bladder cancer avoid surgical removal of their bladders in a late-stage trial.
The treatment kept many patients cancer-free for more than two years and caused mostly mild side effects, according to a report of the study in The Lancet Oncology.
The 115 patients in the study had high-risk bladder cancer that had returned despite standard treatment with bacillus Calmette-Guérin. Instead of surgery to remove the bladder – the usual next step – patients received cretostimogene grenadenorepvec, being developed by CG Oncology.
Two years later, 81% of patients had not needed surgery to remove their bladder, the researchers found.
The treatment produced a complete response, meaning no detectable signs of cancer, in 75% of the patients, with roughly 60% of those complete responses lasting beyond two years, the researchers said.
“Avoiding bladder removal can have a profound impact on daily living. Seeing patients remain cancer-free for years while keeping their bladder is exactly the outcome we’ve been hoping to achieve,” study leader Dr. Mark Tyson of the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale, Arizona, said in a statement.
In one patient, the cancer has not returned for more than four years after completing treatment.
“For patients, this isn’t just about treating cancer. It’s about preserving quality of life,” Tyson said.
WEARABLE PATCH HELPS FINE-TUNE PARKINSON’S MEDICATION DOSING
A fingertip patch that continuously tracks Parkinson’s disease medication levels through chemicals in sweat has the potential to greatly improve patients’ quality of life, new data suggest.
Prescribing the right dose of levodopa – the gold-standard drug for managing the loss of motor control caused by Parkinson’s disease — is very challenging. Too little leaves patients unable to move, while too much triggers severe, uncontrollable jerking movements.
Doctors currently rely on patients’ diaries to adjust their doses, but the approach is imprecise.
As reported by the research team in PNAS, the fingertip has a high density of sweat glands, and the patch contains an absorbent gel that acts like a sweat sponge to draw sweat out of the pores.
When levodopa in the patient’s sweat comes into contact with enzymes embedded in the patch, it triggers a chemical reaction, which in turn generates a small, measurable voltage. The voltage serves as an indicator of the patient’s levodopa level: lower voltage signals low levels, while higher voltage signals high levels.
In clinical tests involving both healthy volunteers and patients with Parkinson’s, the patch tracked levodopa levels as accurately as standard laboratory blood tests, which take days to return results.
This technology lays the groundwork for a closed-loop system, where a levodopa monitoring patch could communicate with a pump to automatically deliver the precise doses of the drug right when the body needs it, the researchers said.
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(Reporting by Nancy Lapid; Editing by Bill Berkrot)
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