Again - it's by state. My policy started at $12/month the first year we were required to buy one. Now it's up to $25/mo. It's useful for generic antibiotics - $1.00 to $4.00. Of course this doesn't cover the OTC vitamins I take - Centrum Silver, Citracal, Vitamin D, etc. Still I feel fortunate that I don't have any regular prescriptions.

I am on the waiting list at my PCP's office for Shingrix, so apparently it can be given in a doctor's office. Suppose it might depend on location or the doctor ( mine was complaining that part of their challenge in getting Shringrix is that the pharmacies are getting more doses than the doctors' offices).

I had the earlier shingles vaccine and after developing shingles 5 years later learned that the earlier one lost effectiveness over time and at about 5 years had hardly any prevention ability. I know of people who have had shingles more than once, the health advice is to get Shringrix even after you have had shingles. I really don't want to go through that experience again!

Proton Beam RT in Breast Cancer Provides Benefit, But More Research Required

Kimberly S. Corbin, MD, sheds light on the use of proton radiation therapy in the breast cancer space and which patients may benefit from this approach.

Re those Neratinib trial results ( Phase 3 NALA) - hype over nothing. They won't release the actual numbers until they publicly present the study (ASCO19?), but people in the know have been posting on Twitter saying that PFS is minor, there was no increase to OS, and QOL definitely suffered (lots of concern over this). I hate the way they try to make it sound good when it's not, just trying to pump up their stock price.

the side effects for me re Shingrix: achy, chills, and a very sore arm for about 3 days. I had shingles and was never told I wouldn’t get it again. In fact I was told I am more at risk for getting it again. That’s why I got the 2 part vaccine. I had to wait for it to come in, and then I got a text and could arrange for the injection.

Cancer may no longer be deadly in future, say British researchers announcing breakthrough

27th December 2018 Ragas Clan National Post

LONDON — Scientists have discovered a breakthrough treatment to fight cancer, and claim the disease will no longer be deadly for future generations.

Researchers at the Francis Crick Institute in London believe it is possible to strengthen the body's defences by transplanting immune cells from strangers. Patients will begin to receive the new treatment next year, and the team now wants to establish "immune banks" to store disease-fighting cells.

Prof Adrian Hayday, an immunology expert and group leader of the immunosurveillance laboratory at The Crick, said scientists and doctors could become more like engineers, upgrading the body rather than bombarding it with toxic chemotherapy.

"Using the immune system to fight cancer is the ultimate do-it-yourself approach," he said.

"Even a few years ago the notion that any clinician would look at a patient and deliver a therapy which wasn't going to directly affect the cancer in any way, shape or form, would have been pretty radical. But that's what's happening.

• Canadian lab takes a shot at producing cancer-killing treatment dubbed the 'rarest drug on Earth'
• How a tiny patch under the skin could give an early warning of most deadly cancers
• Scientists discover cancer cells all carry a 'flag,' which could help doctors target and kill tumours

"We're seeing impressive results with cells called natural killer cells. It's very early days but there are patients receiving them in this next year and the year after, and the nice feature is, unlike other immunotherapy, these cells aren't rejected.

"So you have the possibility of developing cell banks that could be used for anyone. You would call them up and deliver them to the clinic just hours before they were needed to be infused.

"We're not quite there yet. But that's what we're trying now. There is every capability of getting cell banks like this established."

Until this year, scientists thought it would be impossible to import a stranger's immune cells as the immunosuppressant drugs needed to ensure the body did not reject them, would cancel out the benefits. But in 2018, scientists realized that immune cells are unlike other cells, and can survive well in another person, opening the door to transplants.

More than 350,000 people are diagnosed with cancer each year, and 30 years ago just one in four people would have survived for 10 years.

But radical advances over the past decade have seen the number of people surviving for at least a decade rise to 50 per cent and the team at The Crick want to make that 75 per cent in the next 15 years.

Prof Charlie Swanton, of the Cancer Evolution and Genome Instability Laboratory, said that the ability now to sequence tumours was heralding a new era of medicine tailor-made for a patient.

"It's a very exciting time. The technology available to us now is just incredible. We're able to sequence the genome of a tumour, understand its micro-environment, how it metabolises, what cells are controlling the tumour, and how those can be manipulated. Using the body's own immune cells to target the tumour is elegant because tumours evolve so quickly there is no way a pharmaceutical company can keep up with it, but the immune system has been evolving for over four billion years to do just that."

Tumours evolve in a branched way, like trees, but scientists have recently found immune cells in their "trunks", which could be crucial to battling the disease from the base up.

Next year, Prof Swanton's team is beginning trials to see if ramping up those specific cells could be effective in fighting lung cancer. He added: "We will be expanding those immune cells from the patient's tumour in the lab and giving them back to the patient in hopefully overwhelming numbers to tackle the tumour at its trunk.

"It's personalised medicine taken to the absolute extreme. Each patients have a unique therapy, it's pretty much impossible to have the same treatment because no two tumours are the same."

The team is also studying a group of people known as "elite controllers", who have genetic mutations that prevent them developing cancer. In mice which have been genetically engineered to have the same mutations, it is almost impossible to induce skin cancer.

"One of the pivotal breakthroughs in HIV was the recognition of people with elite controllers who had mutations in receptors which rendered them resistant to infection and that changed the landscape utterly," added Prof Hayday.

"We have a group in Sardinia who have a conspicuously low rate of cancers. Despite the suffering that continues to plague the oncology wards, the family, the friends, the basis for optimism is extraordinary.

"I would go so far as to say that we might reach a point, maybe 20 years from now, where the vast majorities of cancers are rapidly treated diseases or long-term chronic issues that you can manage. And I think the immune system will be essential in doing that.

"Between 1980 and 2010, 519,000 cancer deaths were avoided because of cancer research. If that's not a note for optimism I don't know what is."

Prof Swanton added: "Bear in mind 30 years ago that was one in four so survival has doubled in my lifetime and I think it will double again over the next 30 years. The future is incredibly bright."

New #breastcancer clinical trial on ClinicalTrials.gov: NIMBUS: A Phase II Study of Nivolumab Plus Ipilimumab in Metastatic Hypermutated HER2-negative Breast Cancer

https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03789110

Scary indeed. I always assumed it improved ones picture and not potentially making it worse.

Indeed, sounds like chemo prior to surgery is very scary , but I am glad all results are shared, not just positive and predictable.

I had chemo prior to surgery and not only it shrunk my tumors, it has eliminated cancer cells completely per my pathology report. I know that does not happen every time, but it does happen. And if I had chemo after the surgery, I would not have even known if the treatment has worked or not. And because I had known, I was able to opt out of additional chemo post surgery.

Marien, intresting.... especially given the research you posted on Dec. 30 "Chemotherapy before breast cancer surgery might fuel metastasis".... well, I don't know how this adds up... so many research reports and often quite contradictory, like these two... just thinking "aloud"

Antibiotic may prevent breast cancer recurrence

Published Monday 8 October 2018

By Tim Newman

Fact checked by Jasmin Collier

https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/323262.p...

Generic Name: doxycycline (DOX i SYE kleen)

Brand Names: Acticlate, Adoxa CK, Adoxa Pak, Adoxa TT, Alodox, Avidoxy, Doryx, Mondoxyne NL, Monodox, Morgidox, Oracea, Oraxyl, Periostat Targadox, Vibramycin calcium, Vibramycin Hyclate, Vibramycin monohydrate, Vibra-Tabs

Diet relates to an article I saw regarding cancer as a metabolic disease not a genetic one. I get really frustrated with buying fruit and vegetables because of the pesticides in trying to eat healthier. And so much of the processed food is bad for us because it is processed,

re chemo first vs surgery first... surgery also can provoke an inflammatory response which can cause the dissemination of cancer cells too. I read about that, and practices of anesthesia etc that discourage this from happening. And finally, there is the recent news that cells get out of tumors and into bloodstream at very early points in time, far ahead of visible lymph involvement. So most of us are systemic before we think we are. I did chemo first and it apparently worked very well but I still have concerns about stem cells lurking.

A comprehensive list of treatments for stage IV.

https://thestormriders.org/science-research/promising-drugs/