View clinical trials related to Pancreatic Neoplasms.
Filter by:The purpose of this study is to determine whether prednisone, methotrexate, and cyclophosphamide are effective in the treatment of rapidly progressive hearing loss in both ears due to autoimmune inner ear disease (AIED).
Background: - The p53 gene normally helps to stop cancer cells from growing. However, when the p53 gene is mutated or damaged, cancer cells may grow unchecked. Researchers have been working on a vaccine that will help the immune system recognize and destroy cells that have the p53 mutation and may be cancerous. - CT-011 is another drug that may help the body's immune system to fight cancer. This drug blocks a chemical found on tumor cells that prevents the immune system from recognizing and destroying them. Research studies have shown that CT-011 slows the growth of tumors. By combining the p53 vaccine and CT-011, researchers hope to slow or stop tumor growth in people whose cancer that has not responded to standard treatments. Objectives: - To test the safety and effectiveness of CT-011 and the p53 genetic vaccine to treat adults with solid tumors that have not responded to standard treatments. Eligibility: - People at least 18 years of age who have solid tumors that have not responded to standard treatments. Design: - Participants will be screened with a medical history and physical exam. They will also have blood tests and tumor imaging studies. - Participants will receive the p53 vaccine as an injection in the arm or thigh. - Two days after receiving the p53 vaccine, those in the study will receive CT-011 as an infusion over about 2 hours. Participants will be monitored during the infusion for any side effects. - The combination of p53 vaccine and CT-011 will be repeated every 3 weeks (one cycle). Treatment will continue as long as the side effects are not severe and the tumor does not grow. - Three weeks after the second dose of p53 vaccine and CT-011, participants will have a full physical exam. They will also have blood tests, and tumor imaging studies. This exam set will be repeated after every two cycles of p53 vaccine and CT-011. - Participants will have regular follow-up visits for up to a year after stopping treatment.
Accurate preoperative tumor detection and staging are fundamental for treating patients with pancreatic adenocarcinoma. Patients with unresectable tumors can benefit from being spared an extensive operation associated with substantial morbidity and mortality, cost, and pain. On the other hand, patients with localized disease, which is amenable to surgical removal, have the option of operation. Therefore, accurate staging of pancreatic cancer requires the detection of the tumor, and evaluation of its size, its relationship to major peri-pancreatic vascular structures and portal venous system, locoregional lymph nodes, and distant metastases. Multiple imaging techniques have been used to evaluate the pancreas. Although, at this point, no consensus exists as to the best staging algorithm, multidetector (MD) computed tomogrophy (CT) and Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) provide sufficient information for the management of most patients. Patients with a tumor larger than 3 cm are characterized as non-surgical. CT sensitivity in detecting small pancreatic tumors of less than 2 cm is low. Multiple methods have been suggested to increase the sensitivity of CT. The sensitivity of CT increases with using multidetector CT which now has an accuracy rate of about 95-97% for initial detection and approximating that of 100% for staging. Secretin (a natural hormone produced by the duodenal mucosal cells) is known to increase blood flow to the pancreas. The principal use of secretin in imaging today is in exocrine function of the pancreas or morphological evaluation of the pancreatic duct under ultrasound or MRI. Theoretically, pancreatic contrast enhancement should also increase after secretin administration. This would imply that tumor conspicuity might also be increased if contrast enhancement of the normal pancreas increases. Secretin CT has been advocated by other centers to improve depiction of the ampulla and periampullary/duodenal diseases and to improve contrast enhancement. O'Connell et al, used secretin in patients suspected or with known pancreatic mass and concluded that administration of intravenous secretin leads to greater enhancement of the pancreas with greater tumor conspicuity, than imaging without secretin. MRI of the pancreas has undergone a major change because it can provide noninvasive images of the pancreatic ducts and the parenchyma. MR cholangiopancreatography (MRCP) enables detection of anatomic variants such as pancreas divisum. Although contrast material-enhanced CT is still considered the gold standard in acute pancreatitis and for the detection of calcifications in chronic pancreatitis, MR imaging and secretin-enhanced MRCP are useful in evaluating pseudocysts and pancreatic disruption. The role of MR is still debated in pancreatic neoplasms except the cystic lesions where MR imaging provides critical information regarding the lesion's content and a possible communication with the pancreatic ducts. Although some articles have shown that MRI was equivalent to CT in diagnosis and staging, others have shown the opposite. Nishiharu et al. found comparable tumor detection but a benefit with CT, notably for peripancreatic and vascular invasion. Comparing CT, echoendoscopy, and MRI, Soriano et al. demonstrated that CT showed the highest level of precision in primary tumor staging, local-regional staging, vascular invasion, distant metastases, Tumor, node, metastasis (TNM) staging, and tumor resectability. MRI retains its originality in imaging the parenchyma, the pancreatic and biliary ducts, and vascular structures; however, in many institutions, CT remains the reference imaging choice for diagnosing and staging pancreatic cancer. Other than CT's advantages for the tumor, its excellent spatial resolution also provides detailed reconstructions in all planes and arterial mapping and therefore makes it possible to search for surgical contraindications such as celiac trunk stenosis. MRI is still used today as a second-intention tool when there is doubt or when CT and echoendoscopy are not sufficiently conclusive; it is not currently recommended to use MRI in first-intention diagnosis of pancreatic cancer. The aim of this pilot study is to determine whether the administration of intravenous secretin before contrast-enhanced CT and MRI improves pancreatic enhancement and pancreatic tumor conspicuity and to evaluate which technique is more appropriate for pancreatic tumor detection, staging and evaluation of resectability.
In this study, a new chemotherapeutic agent, panitumumab, will be tested in combination with another chemotherapeutic drug, capecitabine, along with external radiotherapy, to find out whether this combination is effective and safe to use before surgery.
The aim of the study is to evaluate the utility of secretin-enhanced MRI (S-MRI) in detecting and measuring pancreatic lesions in patients with known adenocarcinoma or Intraductal papillary mucinous neoplasm (IPMN) lesions. The hypothesis is that S-MRI is superior to MRI without secretin enhancement (N-MRI) in increasing tumor conspicuity, allowing for improved identification and more accurate measurement of lesions or precursor lesions in the pancreas.
The aim of our study is to evaluate S-MRCP, in comparison to direct pancreatic function, to measure pancreatic exocrine function in patients who have symptoms suspicious for insufficiency. We hypothesize that S-MRCP imaging parameters will correlate well with the direct pancreatic exocrine functioning.
The aim of this study will be to determine whether secretin-enhanced MRCP (S-MRCP) as well as traditional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the pancreas will allow the investigators to quantify the pancreas' ability to secrete hormones as well as digestive enzymes, both before and after surgery. The investigators hypothesize that S-MRCP will provide a novel non-invasive measure of pancreatic function.
We propose to recruit subjects scheduled for pancreatectomy as a treatment for pancreatic cancer. These subjects will ingest a very low dose of radiolabeled PhIP, a meat-derived carcinogen, and a small amount of resected tissue (waste) will be analyzed with highly sensitive technology to determine if this carcinogen binds to DNA in the pancreas.
Pancreatic cysts are common, and some pancreas cysts have malignant potential. Usual treatment of these cysts is either observation or surgical removal of part or all of the pancreas. Minimally invasive treatment via endoscopy has been described, using endoscopic ultrasound (EUS) guided ethanol injections. Such studies exclude cysts that communicate with the main pancreatic duct, to avoid burning the main pancreatic duct with ethanol. In this study, pancreas cysts communicating with the main pancreas duct are treated with ethanol via endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography (ERCP) and/or EUS.
We believe that laparoscopic distal pancreatectomy for cancer allows quicker recovery and significantly reduces the chances of postoperative wound breakdown. This will shorten the wait time required to begin adjuvant therapy to one week after surgery thereby combating the micrometastasis unseen at the time of surgery. Prognosis for patients with pancreatic cancer will therefore improve along with decreasing the incidence of locoregional recurrence.