UT Health RGV received a Cancer Prevention and Research Insitute of Texas (CPRIT) grant of $200,000 for pancreatic research on Aug. 18.
According to cprit.state.tx.us, CPRIT offers several funding opportunities for promising cancer research, product development, and prevention programs.
Assistant professor in the Department of Medical Oncology in the School of Medicine and the principal investigator of the CPRIT award Bilal Hafeez said that pancreatic cancer currently has the third highest mortality rate among all major cancers, with a 12% chance of survival behind colon and lung cancer, with research showing that it can move up to be the second fatal cancer in the coming years.
Hafeez explained that UT Health RGV aims to use this grant as an opportunity to learn more effective methods for treating pancreatic cancer.
“So my laboratory is looking to understand the biology of pancreatic cancer,” he said. “This is a very important aspect to developing new drugs for treating the pancreatic cancer patients. So, in line with that, we are working on to understand the process of ribosome biogenisis and pancreatic cancer. Because what we found in our lab is that this process is upregulated [increase the cancer cells] in pancreatic cancer cells.”
Professor and Chairman for the Department of Immunology and Microbiology Director of the Institute of Cancer Immunotherapy School of Medicine Dr. Subhash Chauhan expressed that many factors can contribute to the development of pancreatic cancer, such as genetics, bad eating habits, obesity, diabetes, smoking or drinking and an unnoticed stress factor.
“We always criticize alcoholism or smoking, which is I am not saying it is good, and we appreciate that, this is bad.” Chauhan said. “But think about, stress is going to do the same kind of damage. What [are] your three or four alcohol packs going to do? So just imagine if you are stressed all the time, then how dangerous it is for the body.”
Dr. Vijian Dhevan said it is very difficult to detect if someone has pancreatic cancer due to it being inside the body with no visual deformities to identify. Although loss of appetite, nausea, and pain while eating have been found to be clear indicators that something is wrong.
“No matter what cancer it is, we always ask patients, have you lost weight? ‘Oh, yes doc I have’.” Dhevan said. “How much weight have you lost? ‘10 to 20 pounds over the last couple of months’. Is this an intensional weight loss? ‘No Doc I’m eating the same stuff. I’m eating. I’m doing the same thing. I can’t keep on the weight’. That unintentional weight loss is a clear sign of some kind of malignancy. It’s not a definite sign of malignancy, but it kind of makes our ears perk up.”
For more information about UT Health RGV visit uthealthrgv.org
This is Timothy Chapman for vaquero Radio
