AI to predict how bowel cancer patients will respond to new NHS drug
A new AI-driven way of identifying how patients with advanced bowel cancer will respond to a drug that was recently introduced by the NHS has been announced.Researchers at London’s Institute of Cancer Research and the RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences in Dublin have developed the method with the goal of sparing potentially thousands of patients from being given drugs that would be ineffective in fighting their cancers.In the UK alone, nearly 10,000 cases of advanced bowel cancer are identified every year, with young adults seeing a particular rise in diagnoses.Bowel cancer has the second highest mortality rate of any cancer, behind only lung cancer, and while survival rates can be as high as 98% when caught early, the five-year survival rate for advanced bowel cancer can be as low as 10%.The study tracked 117 European bowel cancer patients who had been treated with chemotherapy and bevacizumab, a drug that was approved by the NHS in December.
Bevacizumab works by slowing the rate at which cancer develops by depriving tumours of the proteins that they need to grow, but is only effective for a small pool of patients, and carries serious side-effects such as blood clots and gastrointestinal issues.Using PhenMap, an AI tool that is a portmanteau of “phenotype” (an organism’s observable traits) and “mapping”, researchers have said they were able to “integrate complex data on the genetic makeup of the tumour”.This allowed them to track patterns of how different patients reacted to the drug, as well as identify a group of patients who all had the same gene mutation and were all at a high risk of having negative reactions.Following this breakthrough, the scientists behind the tests now hope to expand the number of patient samples, as well as see if the results from the study can be used in the treatments other types of cancer.Anguraj Sadanandam, a professor in stratification and precision medicine at the ICR, said: “Once bowel cancer spreads to other parts of the body, there are very few treatment options available for patients.
It is therefore positive that patients can now access the targeted drug bevacizumab on the NHS,“However, we know that the majority of patients won’t benefit from the drug, meaning thousands of people in England could be facing unpleasant side effects unnecessarily,Until now, we haven’t been able to identify these patients,“Our research uses advanced AI methods to pull together large amounts of complex data, helping us to spot patterns that would otherwise be impossible for a human to see, and to uncover the clues hidden within a patient’s tumour,In our research, we have shown that this allows us to identify the patients least likely to respond to treatment with bevacizumab.
”But, while he said the findings were encouraging, he added that the tool would need to be tested on a larger cohort to be validated.“In future, I hope this approach will lead to a test that can be used by clinicians, to ensure patients receive personalised care that has the highest chance of working against their cancer,” Sadanandam said.
The Guide #238: The overlooked underdogs of British quizshows that are still worth a stream
The quizshow will never die. Nuclear war could rid the earth of all living creatures bar the cockroaches and still, a shiny floored half-hourer hosted by Stephen Mulhern will somehow be airing on the emergency broadcast system. Quizshows have been airing on British screens since 1938, when a televised spelling bee was broadcast on the BBC, and they have remained remarkably resilient. Today they seem a good accompaniment to an era where everyone seems to be tapping away at puzzles on their phone.Scroll down the channel guide of your TV and it won’t be long until you find a quizshow (and that one will almost certainly be The Chase)
‘I got everything I dreamed of – when I had no ability to handle it’: Lena Dunham on toxic fame, broken friendships and her ‘lost decade’
Stardom came fast and hard for the wunderkind who created the hit HBO series Girls aged just 23. Now she’s written a tell-all memoir about why she was forced to retreat from the spotlight Lena Dunham on going to rehab: read an exclusive extract from FamesickIf there is something to be learned from the words people pick for their passwords and proxies, then Lena Dunham’s choice of aliases – pseudonyms that, as a public person, she has used over the years to conceal her identity when checking into rehab or ordering room service – give us a tiny glimpse into the writer and director’s self-image. Among her staples, “Lauri Reynolds” (after her mum, Laurie, with whom she is strikingly close); “Rose O’Neill” (after the American millionaire illustrator, who lost her fortune to burnout and hangers-on); and my favourite, “Renata Halpern”, an alias Dunham shares with readers of her delicious new memoir, Famesick, without explaining the name’s origin.“Has anyone else clocked the Renata Halpern reference?” I ask Dunham, who is in her apartment in New York, talking fast via video call while waiting for an egg-and-cheese bagel to be run up from the deli. On the brink of 40, she is in her dark-haired era – very Jane Russell in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes – which, this morning, is set against a bright orange shirt and the pale, glowy skin she describes as the single happy side-effect of hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, a genetic condition of the connective tissue with which Dunham was diagnosed in 2019
From You, Me & Tuscany to Euphoria: your complete entertainment guide to the week ahead
Halle Bailey and Regé-Jean Page star in a slinky new romcom, while the dissolute teens of the US drama are back in their 20sYou, Me & TuscanyOut now Where would the romcom be if everyone told the truth? When impulsive cook Anna (Halle Bailey) tells a porky pie about being engaged in order to justify her presence in an abandoned Tuscan villa, a train of events leading to true love is – naturally – set in motion. Regé-Jean Page and Nia Vardalos co-star.The StrangerOut now In 1930s Algiers, a young man, Meursault, commits murder. The premise will be familiar to Albert Camus ride-or-dies, for this is indeed an adaptation of the literary giant’s debut, from François Ozon. Rising French actor Benjamin Voisin plays the unassuming antihero, with Pierre Lottin as the dodgy neighbour whose private life spells trouble
Kimmel on Trump: ‘He talks about war like he’s bragging about women with Billy Bush’
Jimmy Kimmel expressed frustration over Donald Trump’s confusing statements on Iran while also expressing shock over Melania Trump’s surprise statement.The ABC host spoke about the ongoing war in Iran that is happening “for reasons known only to Donald Trump” and how we remain unsure over the strait of Hormuz and whether it is or isn’t open.Kimmel joked that with all the back and forth over it, “basically after all this he got us is constipation”.Trump has been teasing a “grand reopening” as well as a possible business partnership with Iran “which makes no sense”.Kimmel joked that “he’ll put it on his vision board and will it to be true” before moving on to his threats on social media teasing the military’s “next conquest”
Jimmy Kimmel on US ceasefire negotiators: ‘We’d be better off with Alvin and the Chipmunks’
On Wednesday night, late-night hosts reacted to Donald Trump’s threat to wipe out Iran, the trio who are leading ceasefire negotiations in the region and JD Vance’s trip to Budapest in support of Viktor Orbán.Jimmy Kimmel focused on the ceasefire that resulted from Trump’s warning that “an entire civilization will die” if Iran did not meet US demands to open the strait of Hormuz.“Once again, he made a big threat and backed off like your dad threatening to pull the car over and turn it around,” Kimmel said.“What a time to be alive. A man who has the nuclear codes written on his stomach in ketchup has the power to wipe a whole country off the map
Jimmy Kimmel on Trump’s Iran threats: ‘The most dangerous episode of the Celebrity Apprentice yet’
Late-night hosts reacted to a late-stage ceasefire with Iran, after Donald Trump promised “a whole civilization will die tonight” in an extremely alarming post.Tuesday was just “another crazy day here in the United States of America!” said Jimmy Kimmel, after the president promised, then called off, destructive attacks in Iran by 8pm that evening. “Probably the most dangerous episode of the Celebrity Apprentice yet. Today was D-Day – in this case, the D stands for dementia, but it was D-Day.”“We’re coming to you from Los Angeles for the local time’s just after 5pm, which was Trump’s deadline for Iran to ‘Open the F-ing strait or you’ll be living in hell,’” the host explained
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