Oncology news

The international conference European Digestive Cancer Days 2017, which was focused on the prevention of digestive cancers, was held in Prague, Czech Republic, on 26–27 September 2017.

Experts from United European Gastroenterology (UEG) [1], presenting at the European Digestive Cancer Days (EDCD) Conference [2] in Prague today, are calling on European governments to focus their efforts on developing early diagnosis techniques, in order to save thousands of lives from digestive cancers including a more targeted approach to ensure at risk patients don’t ‘slip through the early-detection net’.

The WCRF has just published an extensive report [1] summarising all published studies of the links between specific lifestyle factors and the risk of developing colorectal cancer. This report, which updates those published earlier [2, 3] with the inclusion of newer research, collates results from 99 studies that together include over 29 million adult participants, over 247,000 of whom developed colorectal cancer.

A vaccine that can literally eradicate the majority of cervical cancer cases shows long-term effectiveness in a study published in The Lancet [1].

The European region has the highest levels of alcohol consumption in the world, with one fifth of the population aged 15 and above drinking heavily at least once a week. As a result, the continent also has the highest proportion of total ill health and premature death directly linked to alcohol. Alcohol consumption is a known risk factor for digestive cancers, including oesophageal, liver, pancreatic, colorectal and gastric cancer.

Researchers of the Colorectal Cancer research group of Bellvitge Biomedical Research Institute (IDIBELL), led by Dr. Víctor Moreno, and linked to the Catalan Institute of Oncology (ICO), the University of Barcelona (UB) and the Epidemiology And Public Health CIBER (CIBEResp), have issued the first predictive risk model of colon and rectal cancer based on Spanish data that combines genetic and lifestyle information. Their work, published by Scientific Reports, highlights the importance of improving lifestyle to reduce the risk of colon cancer and suggests to use a combination of lifestyle and genetic information to subdivide the population into different groups according to their colon cancer risk, which would fine tune the current screening method.

New research funded by the World Cancer Research Fund International, published in the British Medical Journal, concluded that obesity is linked to 11 cancers.

The implementation report on the 2003 Council Recommendation on cancer screening, published today [1], reveals a steep rise in national screening programmes for breast, cervical and colorectal cancer.

Today, on World Cancer Day, millions are urged to get active to help combat one of the world’s most deadly diseases. Under the banner “We can. I can.” the day will encourage people to be more active – in every sense – in the fight against a disease that, in less than two decades, will directly affect up to 21.7 million people per year [1].