Ovarian Cancer: Advances in First-Line Treatment Strategies with a Particular Focus on Anti-Angiogenic Agents

Ovarian cancer is an important health concern worldwide. The majority of patients present with advanced disease, and despite initial chemosensitivity, most relapse and die from their disease. Better therapeutic options are urgently required. Maximal surgical debulking in combination with platinum/taxane chemotherapy has been the standard of care in advanced ovarian cancer since the mid-1990s. Trials investigating the addition of a third chemotherapeutic agent have disappointingly failed to demonstrate benefit. Intra-peritoneal therapy demonstrated improvements in outcomes in some trials, but at the cost of increased toxicity and inconvenience. Encouragingly, prospective data has now demonstrated benefits with bevacizumab in both the first-line and relapsed settings; however, interpretation is complex, particularly considering recent data demonstrating non-inferiority of neo-adjuvant chemotherapy with delayed primary surgery, and other data demonstrating a substantial improvement in outcome as a result of first-line paclitaxel dose fractionation. This article reviews the recent advances in ovarian cancer treatment and discusses current management and key areas for future research.     

English Proficiency, Knowledge, and Receipt of HPV Vaccine in Vietnamese-American Women

Cervical cancer is one of the most important disease burdens experienced by Vietnamese-American women. Human papillomavirus (HPV) is the etiological agent in almost all cases of cervical cancer. We surveyed Vietnamese-American women to determine receipt of HPV vaccine and assessed if limited English proficiency and knowledge related to HPV vaccine were associated with HPV vaccine uptake. Of the 113 Vietnamese-American women who participated in the study, 58 % (n = 68) was born in Vietnam. The mean years of residency in the United States was 12.75 years. Only 16 (14 %) reported receiving HPV vaccine and 11 (9 %) reported receiving all three shots. Thirteen women responded that they are not at all likely to receive HPV vaccine. Of the whole sample, 47 % (n = 53) reported proficiency in spoken and written English. English proficiency was significantly associated with receipt of HPV vaccine (OR = 4.4; confidence interval (95 % CI) = 1.2; 16.50; p = 0.03). Of the knowledge items, 70 % (n = 79) responded correctly that HPV increases the risk for cervical cancer. However, as many as 60 % responded incorrectly, that HPV infection can be cured with medication. The item, “People infected with HPV can be cured with medication,” was the most important variable associated with receipt of HPV vaccine. Specifically, those with correct response were 3.8 times more likely to report receiving the HPV vaccine (OR = 3.8; 95 % CI = 1.1; 13.5; p = 0.04). Important public health needs are the development and evaluation of educational programs on HPV and cervical cancer that are designed for Vietnamese-American women.     

Book Received

There exist numerous difficulties in the recruitment of patients to drug trials for Alzheimer's disease. This article describes a successful community-based case-finding strategy. The success is largely attributed to effective liaison between the co-ordinating psychiatrist, GPs, community psychiatric nurses and practice nurses.     

Early Psychological Preventive Intervention For Workplace Violence: A Randomized Controlled Explorative and Comparative Study Between EMDR-Recent Event and Critical Incident Stress Debriefing

This randomized controlled trial study aims to investigate the efficacy of an early psychological intervention called EMDR-RE compared to Critical Incident Stress Debriefing on 60 victims of workplace violence, which were divided into three groups: ‘EMDR-RE’ (n = 19), ‘CISD’ (n = 23), and ‘delayed EMDR-RE’ (n = 18). EMDR-RE and CISD took place 48 hours after the event, whilst third intervention was delayed by an additional 48 hours. Results showed that after 3 months PCLS and SUDS scores were significantly lower with EMDR-RE and delayed EMDR-RE compared to CISD. After 48 hours and 3 months, none of the EMDR-RE-treated victims showed PTSD symptoms.