MacGill, Markus. "Pancreatic Cancer: Chemo Drug
Gemzar Improves Survival Rates." Medical News Today. MediLexicon
International Ltd, 09 Oct. 2013. Web. 12 Oct. 2013.
The article, “Pancreatic Cancer:
Chemo Drug Gemzar Improves Survival Rates,” written by Markus MacGill, reports
that patients, who are treated with the drug gemcitabine six months after
having surgery to remove pancreatic cancer, will survive longer. Gemcitabine is
a chemotherapy drug marketed in the US under the name Gemzar. Authors conclude
that gemcitabine results in a 24% improvement in survival. Researchers found
that, in addition to pancreatic surgery removal, the use of gemcitabine
improves the overall absolute numbers of people surviving five years.
Specifically, 10.4% of patients survive for five years while not being given
gemcitabine, while 20.7% of patients survive for five years while being treated
with gemcitabine. Furthermore, there was a 4.5% increase in the 10-year
absolute survival rate when taking gemcitabine. Helmut Oettle, of the Berlin
University Hospital Charité in Germany, investigated whether gemcitabine improved
overall survival rates as well as freedom from disease progression. Thus,
patients who had their pancreatic cancer fully removed by surgery participated
in this investigation. The patients entered the study between July of 1998 and
December of 2004 from a variety of hospitals located in Germany and Austria. 354
patients had been analyzed with 308 having cancer relapse. However, after
analyzing their data and comparing them to those who only received observation,
researchers have concluded that the adjuvant use of gemcitabine for six months
led to an increased overall survival as well as disease-free survival.
According to the article,
“…pancreatic cancer is responsible for 227,000 deaths worldwide every year, and
is the eighth most common cause of death from cancer” (MacGill 2013). Having
the availability of a drug that will increase overall survival as well as
disease-free survival, is helpful and incredible. Gemcitabine is also licensed
for use in advanced ovarian cancer, metastatic breast cancer, and non-small
cell lung cancer. Cancer has become so common; although scientists do not know
all the reasons why cancer occurs, they do know that cancer can be due to heredity,
diet, hormones, chemicals, environment, radiation, and viruses or bacteria.
Gemcitabine can benefit many people and open the door to more research in the
field of oncology.
The article was interesting and
educational. It connected to me because my grandmother passed away from
pancreatic cancer. Therefore, while reading the article, I was siding with the
author, thinking that gemcitabine is useful. However, the author should have
also pulled in the other perspective, how the drug can be harmful. MacGill
should have included the side-effects or any negative sides of the drug.
My classmate Maria did a good job reviewing the article “Pancreatic Cancer: Chemo Drug Gemzar Improves Survival Rates.” The article is about a study done on the chemotherapy drug Gemcitabine, known as Gemzar, which is used for treating pancreatic cancer. The study showed that Gemzar not only increased overall survival, but also decreased the likelihood of cancer relapse. Maria did a good job of explaining the study itself in simple words. The study, although not too complicated, can seem slightly confusing. However, Maria was able to explain the study in simple terms. Maria also did a good job in using quotes. Quotes help to better understand what the review is saying by using the exact words of the author. Maria effectively utilized the quotes to better the review. Maria also gave background information on the study of cancer. She explains a bit on how scientists know so little about pancreatic cancer and cancer in general, but do not it can be caused by certain factors. This helps the reader better understand the topic at hand.
ReplyDeleteAlthough the review was very well written, it could use some improvements. For example, Maria could have done some outside research and explain what exactly Gemzar does. This would help the reader understand the study better. Maria could have also done a better job on describing certain terms, such as disease-free survival. I am not entirely sure what this means. These minor errors, although are necessary to change, do not affect the review too much.
The most interesting thing about the article is that there are drugs that can actually increase the survival of the one of the most deadly diseases. It shows that this could be the first step towards finding an effective treatment for pancreatic cancer. Overall, Maria’s review was an interesting and informative read.
I read the article review by Maria on “Pancreatic Cancer: Chemo Drug Gemzar Improves Survival Rates,” written by Markus MacGill. I thought she did a very good job in explaining the article. If I had not read the article, I think Maria’s interpretation would have conveyed a fairly similar message to an uninformed reader. I thought she thoroughly explained the affect that Gemzar has on patients and she successfully explained, using the experiments mentioned in the article, how this drug generally helps increase the survival rate over 5-years, 10-years, and overall helps reduce the relapse of cancer. I also thought it was very important that Maria include the statistics of the number of people who are affected by pancreatic cancer. I personally was shocked to realize over 200,000 people die from pancreatic cancer a year. This made the drug information about increasing life span of pancreatic cancer survivors even more prevalent. I hope this research will benefit people years to come. Finally, I thought Maria did a very nice job of connecting this article to her grandmother. I was sorry to hear that Maria has experienced this, but I was happy that there are drugs out there to help people like her grandmother.
ReplyDeleteI thought Maria’s article review could have been improved by including more detail. Though I know she is not an expert, I think that there were more details in the actual article which could have easily been transferred over to make a smoother read. I also think her review could have been improved by including more about her opinion on how the author wrote the article. While I read it, I know I had a few critiques (too ambiguous, mostly), so it would have been nice had she put that into words for comment-readers.
I was really amazed by the number of people affected by cancer in general. I always knew it was a large number, but it was difficult to comprehend that pancreatic cancer was only the 8th largest killer, which killed over 200,000 people per year. I don’t even want to know how many people are killed by the cancer responsible for the number 1 killer. It makes me sad to realize this.
I read the review by my classmate Maria Kapsis on the article, “Pancreatic Cancer: Chemo Drug Gemzar Improves Survival Rates.” This article is about how the chemotherapy drug, Gemicitabine, or Gemzar for short, increases the chances for longer survival for patients with pancreatic cancer. In addition to pancreatic surgery removal, when using Gemzar there was an increase of 4.5% in the 10-year absolute survival rate. Maria did an outstanding job writing a review for this article. She summarized the article to a simple yet knowledgeable review that allowed for a reader who hadn’t read the article to full grasp what she was saying. One thing Maria did very well in order to produce such a well-written review was she immediately started with background information on the drug gemicitabine. I also thought Maria did a good job incorporating quotes from the article into her own summary, this makes her review more verifiable. Maria ended her article strong by introducing ideas of how the very same drug, Gemzar, is also helping other types of cancers including ovarian cancer, metastatic breast cancer, and even non-small cell lung cancer. One thing Maria could have done differently to enhance her article review is expand on how the drug actually improves the survival rate, what does it do in the body to make this happen. One other thing Maria could have done was incorporate a quote from the one scientist she mentioned, Helmut Oettle, in order to provide more information on the experiment that proved the drug worked. One thing that really stuck with me after reading this review was the fact that pancreatic cancer is the 8th most common cause of death per year. This is very scary, but it is good to know that there are scientists all around the world doing everything they can in order to defeat all types of cancer.
ReplyDeleteMaria chose an interesting article, “Pancreatic Cancer: Chemo Drug Gemzar Improves Survival Ratesm” and she summarized and explained it very well in her review. She started with a clearly written summary of the article that was easy to understand because it was simple and concise. I also thought Maria did a great job of incorporating quotes and statistics into her review. They were cited well and added to my understanding of the topic. A third thing I liked about Maria's review was that she had a close connection to the article so that the reader could tell it is an important subject for her. I have also lost family members to cancer and have a friend whose father is fighting it right now, so I can empathize with her from those terrible experiences.
ReplyDeleteThere were a couple of things I thought she could add to make her review even better. For example, she could have included more specific details about the article. I understood the concept from the review and appreciated that the summary portion was concisely written, but after reading the actual article as well, I think that more detail could have been added to the summary. I also thought she could have included some outside information about how the effectiveness of the drug gemcitabine compares to that of other cancer-fighting drugs.
I was pleasantly surprised that this drug has shown such significant results already. One of my family members who passed away from cancer actually had this form of the disease, and I remember how quickly it progressed and how that made it even more tragic. Therefore, I am happy that gemcitabine is adding years to the lives of people who are affected by pancreatic cancer.