Research
Because cancer is a class of diseases, it is unlikely that there will ever be a single "cure for cancer" any more than there will be a single treatment for all infectious diseases. Angiogenesis inhibitors were once thought to have potential as a "silver bullet" treatment applicable to many types of cancer, but this has not been the case in practice.
Experimental cancer treatments are treatments that are being studied to see whether they work. Typically, these are studied in clinical trials to compare the proposed treatment to the best existing treatment. They may be entirely new treatments, or they may be treatments that have been used successfully in one type of cancer, and are now being tested to see whether they are effective in another type. More and more, such treatments are being developed alongside companion diagnostic tests to target the right drugs to the right patients, based on their individual biology.
Cancer research is the intense scientific effort to understand disease processes and discover possible therapies.
Research about cancer causes focuses 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.
Read more about this topic: Cancer
Famous quotes containing the word research:
“If politics is the art of the possible, research is surely the art of the soluble. Both are immensely practical-minded affairs.”
—Peter B. Medawar (1915–1987)
“To be sure, nothing is more important to the integrity of the universities ... than a rigorously enforced divorce from war- oriented research and all connected enterprises.”
—Hannah Arendt (1906–1975)
“One of the most important findings to come out of our research is that being where you want to be is good for you. We found a very strong correlation between preferring the role you are in and well-being. The homemaker who is at home because she likes that “job,” because it meets her own desires and needs, tends to feel good about her life. The woman at work who wants to be there also rates high in well-being.”
—Grace Baruch (20th century)