Cancer research is the intense scientific effort to understand disease processes and discover possible therapies.
Research about cancer causes focusses on the following issues:
- Agents (e.g. viruses) and events (e.g. mutations) which cause or facilitate genetic changes in cells destined to become cancer.
- The precise nature of the genetic damage, and the genes which are affected by it.
- The consequences of those genetic changes on the biology of the cell, both in generating the defining properties of a cancer cell, and in facilitating additional genetic events which lead to further progression of the cancer.
The improved understanding of
molecular biology and
cellular biology due to cancer research has led to a number of new, effective treatments for cancer since President Nixon declared "
War on Cancer" in 1971. Since 1971 the
United States has invested over $200 billion on cancer research; that total includes money invested by public and private sectors and foundations. Despite this substantial investment, the country has seen a five percent decrease in the cancer death rate (adjusting for size and age of the population) between 1950 and 2005.
Leading cancer research organizations and projects include the
American Association for Cancer Research, the
American Cancer Society (ACS), the
American Society of Clinical Oncology, the
European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer, the
National Cancer Institute, the
National Comprehensive Cancer Network, and
The Cancer Genome Atlas project at the NCI.
hormone therapy
A new study has shown that starting hormone therapy at around the time of menopause is associated with a greater risk of breast cancer compared to starting after a longer gap.
In this large, prospectively followed cohort of women, those who started hormone therapy five years or more after menopause had little or no increased risk, regardless of the type of hormone therapy used, how long they used it, and whether they were overweight or obese.
