BackgroundChemotherapy related cognitive impairment (CRCI) is a type of memory and cognitive impairment induced by chemotherapy and has become a growing clinical problem. Breast cancer survivors (BCs) refer to patients from the moment of breast cancer diagnosis to the end of their lives. Managing Cancer and Living Meaningfully (CALM) is a convenient and easy‐to‐apply psychological intervention that has been proven to improve quality of life and alleviate CRCI in BCs. However, the underlying neurobiological mechanisms remain unclear. Resting‐state functional magnetic resonance imaging (rs‐fMRI) has become an effective method for understanding the neurobiological mechanisms of brain networks in CRCI. The fractional amplitude of low‐frequency fluctuations (fALFF) and ALFF have often been used in analyzing the power and intensity of spontaneous regional resting state neural activity.MethodsThe recruited BCs were randomly divided into the CALM group and the care as usual (CAU) group. All BCs were evaluated by the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy Cognitive Function (FACT‐Cog) before and after CALM or CAU. The rs‐fMRI imaging was acquired before and after CALM intervention in CALM group BCs. The BCs were defined as before CALM intervention (BCI) group and after CALM intervention (ACI) group.ResultsThere were 32 BCs in CALM group and 35 BCs in CAU group completed the overall study. There were significant differences between the BCI group and the ACI group in the FACT‐Cog‐PCI scores. Compared with the BCI group, the ACI group showed lower fALFF signal in the left medial frontal gyrus and right sub‐gyral and higher fALFF in the left occipital_sup and middle occipital gyrus. There was a significant positive correlation between hippocampal ALFF value and FACT‐Cog‐PCI scores.ConclusionsCALM intervention may have an effective function in alleviating CRCI of BCs. The altered local synchronization and regional brain activity may be correlated with the improved cognitive function of BCs who received the CALM intervention. The ALFF value of hippocampus seems to be an important factor in reflect cognitive function in BCs with CRCI and the neural network mechanism of CALM intervention deserves further exploration to promote its application.
Ramucirumab, as a vascular endothelial growth factor receptor-2 inhibitor, was first approved in 2014 for treated advanced or metastatic gastric/gastroesophageal junction (GEJ) adenocarcinoma. This study deeply analyzed the efficacy and safety of advanced or metastatic cancer treated with ramucirumab, which included 11 global, double-blind, phase 3 randomized controlled trials with a total of 7410 patients. Subgroup analysis based on different cancer types showed that standard regimens plus ramucirumab significantly increased progression-free survival and overall survival compared with placebo groups in patients with advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), hepatocellular carcinoma, gastric cancer, or GEJ adenocarcinoma. Although a higher proportion of patients achieved overall response and disease control than those treated with placebo, the overall response was not statistically significant between the two groups in advanced NSCLC. Grade 3 or worse treatment-emergent adverse events (TEAEs) that occurred in at least 5% of patients were neutropenia (30.5% in the ramucirumab group vs. 23.5% in the placebo group), leucopenia (14.8% vs. 9.2%), weight decreased (14.2% vs. 8.0%), myalgia (11.7% vs. 7.7%), fatigue (10.9% vs. 7.7%), hypertension (9.2% vs. 2.3%), and anaemia (6.2% vs. 7.7%). In the TEAEs of special interest, the ramucirumab group had a significantly higher incidence of bleeding (mainly grade 1-2 epistaxis and gastrointestinal bleeding), hypertension, proteinuria, liver injury/failure (grade 1-2), venous thromboembolism (grade 1-2), and gastrointestinal perforation (grade ≧3) than the control group.
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