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Cancer Clinical Trials Experimental Treatments & How They Can Help You

By Robert Finn
First Edition September 1999
Pages: 216
ISBN 10: 1-56592-566-1 | ISBN 13: 9781565925663

Book description

Most cancer patients face treatment options that are less than ideal, whether because of a risk of recurrence or side effects. Finally, however, basic research on cell biology is leading to promising new treatments. If you are not evaluating potential experimental treatments alongside the standard treatment protocols, you aren't considering all the facts you need. Cancer Clinical Trials guides you through understanding your options and finding and considering experimental treatments.
Full Description

For a very few cancers, treatment options are minimally invasive, resoundingly curative, and have very few side effects. However, most cancer patients face treatment options that are less than ideal. The odds they have been given for a chance of recurrence might be frightening. Or, the "cure rate" of treatment might be good, but the side effects (short- or long-term) might be daunting. However, there's great hope on the horizon. Basic research on cell biology is finally yielding important clues about the nature of cancer, and these clues are leading directly to promising new treatments. Physicians are finding better ways to alleviate cancer pain and some of the toxic side effects of chemotherapy. Medical device companies are testing new ways to detect cancer in ever earlier stages. And researchers are even developing therapies that will prevent the development of cancer in people who are at risk. Author Robert Finn, a science and medical journalist, believes that if you are not evaluating potential experimental treatments alongside the standard treatment protocols, you aren't considering all the facts you need. Cancer Clinical Trials is aimed at helping you consider the range of treatment options available through clinical trials -- treatments that may not be available any other way. It includes:

Reasons to consider a trial (as well as reasons to decide against one)
Structure of clinical trials and ethical guidelines
Administration of trials (and what are the interests and involvement of players such as the FDA, pharmaceutical companies, the NCI, scientists)
Inclusion and exclusion criteria for joining a trial
Reading the trial protocol
Hard questions to ask yourself and your doctor
Interviews from researchers and patients

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Book details

First Edition: September 1999
ISBN: 1-56592-566-1
Pages: 216

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Media reviews

"In this excellent book, Robert Finn offers an indispensable guide for the cancer patient who must negotiate many potential quagmires in first finding and then taking part in a clinical trial. I highly recommend this book as a first step in what will be for many a difficult, but crucially important, part of their struggle to beat their cancer. For despite all the obstacles, both individual patients and the medical establishment need clinical trials. They represent our only hope of overcoming the many aspects of the dreaded set of diseases we call cancer." --From the foreword by Robert Bazell, Chief Science Correspondent for NBC News and author of Her-2: The Making of Herceptin, a Revolutionary Treatment for Breast Cancer

"Research into the many forms of cancer has engendered a stream of clinical trials to test experimental drugs and other new treatments, yet only a small fraction of cancer patients is enrolled in these efforts. Fear and lack of information deter some potential participants. Doctors themselves may distrust trials and caution their patients against getting involved. In this clear account of the purpose and logistics of cancer trials, Finn gives readers the information they need to make their own careful decisions." --Science News

"Finn offers a thorough, thoughtful, and well-balanced look at an important topic not covered elsewhere. Recommended for public library and consumer health collections." --Library Journal

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