Haukeland University Hospital

About: Haukeland University Hospital is a healthcare organization based out in Bergen, Norway. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Cancer. The organization has 3833 authors who have published 11617 publications receiving 396135 citations. The organization is also known as: Haukeland universitetssykehus.

Effect of Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy Plus Regional Hyperthermia on Long-term Outcomes Among Patients With Localized High-Risk Soft Tissue Sarcoma: The EORTC 62961-ESHO 95 Randomized Clinical Trial

Abstract: Importance Patients with soft tissue sarcoma are at risk for local recurrence and distant metastases despite optimal local treatment. Preoperative anthracycline plus ifosfamide chemotherapy improves outcome in common histological subtypes. Objective To analyze whether the previously reported improvement in local progression-free survival by adding regional hyperthermia to neoadjuvant chemotherapy translates into improved survival. Design, Setting, and Participants Open-label, phase 3 randomized clinical trial to evaluate the efficacy and toxic effects of neoadjuvant chemotherapy plus regional hyperthermia. Adult patients (age ≥18 years) with localized soft tissue sarcoma (tumor ≥5 cm, French Federation Nationale des Centers de Lutte Contre le Cancer [FNCLCC] grade 2 or 3, deep) were accrued across 9 centers (6, Germany; 1, Norway; 1, Austria; 1, United States) from July 1997 to November 2006. Follow-up ended December 2014. Interventions After stratification for tumor presentation and site, patients were randomly assigned to either neoadjuvant chemotherapy consisting of doxorubicin, ifosfamide, and etoposide alone, or combined with regional hyperthermia. Main Outcomes and Measures The primary end point was local progression-free survival. Secondary end points included treatment safety and survival, with survival defined from date of randomization to death due to disease or treatment. Patients lost to follow-up were censored at the date of their last follow-up. Results A total of 341 patients were randomized, and 329 (median [range] age, 51 [18-70] years; 147 women, 182 men) were eligible for the intention-to-treat analysis. By December 2014, 220 patients (67%; 95% CI, 62%-72%) had experienced disease relapse, and 188 (57%; 95% CI, 52%-62%) had died. Median follow-up was 11.3 years. Compared with neoadjuvant chemotherapy alone, adding regional hyperthermia improved local progression-free survival (hazard ratio [HR], 0.65; 95% CI, 0.49-0.86;P = .002). Patients randomized to chemotherapy plus hyperthermia had prolonged survival rates compared with those randomized to neoadjuvant chemotherapy alone (HR, 0.73; 95% CI, 0.54-0.98;P = .04) with 5-year survival of 62.7% (95% CI, 55.2%-70.1%) vs 51.3% (95% CI, 43.7%-59.0%), respectively, and 10-year survival of 52.6% (95% CI, 44.7%-60.6%) vs 42.7% (95% CI, 35.0%-50.4%). Conclusions and Relevance Among patients with localized high-risk soft tissue sarcoma the addition of regional hyperthermia to neoadjuvant chemotherapy resulted in increased survival, as well as local progression-free survival. For patients who are candidates for neoadjuvant treatment, adding regional hyperthermia may be warranted. Trial Registration clinicaltrials.gov Identifier:NCT00003052

BioContainers: an open-source and community-driven framework for software standardization.

Abstract: Motivation BioContainers (biocontainers.pro) is an open-source and community-driven framework which provides platform independent executable environments for bioinformatics software. BioContainers allows labs of all sizes to easily install bioinformatics software, maintain multiple versions of the same software and combine tools into powerful analysis pipelines. BioContainers is based on popular open-source projects Docker and rkt frameworks, that allow software to be installed and executed under an isolated and controlled environment. Also, it provides infrastructure and basic guidelines to create, manage and distribute bioinformatics containers with a special focus on omics technologies. These containers can be integrated into more comprehensive bioinformatics pipelines and different architectures (local desktop, cloud environments or HPC clusters). Availability and implementation The software is freely available at github.com/BioContainers/. Contact yperez@ebi.ac.uk.

Prognostic significance of histologic grading compared with subclassification of papillary thyroid carcinoma.

Abstract: BACKGROUND Papillary thyroid carcinomas represent a diversity of morphologic subtypes and variants, but to the authors' knowledge the prognostic significance of subclassification is not clear. Therefore, the authors compared the value of histologic classification with a combined assessment of histologic key features such as marked nuclear atypia, tumor necrosis, and vascular invasion (i.e., histologic grade). METHODS One hundred twenty-eight surgically treated patients with papillary carcinoma > 10 mm were studied. The tumors were subclassified and individual histologic features were examined and compared in univariate and multivariate survival analyses. RESULTS Of all the cases, 55% were of the usual type, whereas 27% showed complex histologic features with different components present and 18% represented specific subtypes. Tall cell differentiation showed an increased frequency of tumor necrosis and vascular invasion, and tumors with solid areas had an increased occurrence of mitotic figures and vascular invasion. Patients with tall cell tumors tended to have reduced survival (P = 0.074), and two patients with columnar cell features died of the disease. When combined, the group of patients with all tumor subtypes had significantly reduced survival when compared with the remainder of patients (P = 0.034), although the difference was only minor. Histologic grade was highly significant (P = 0.0001) in survival analysis, together with mitotic frequency (P = 0.028), S-phase (P = 0.015), and G2M-phase fractions (P = 0.040). In multivariate analysis, tumor dimension (P = 0.019) and histologic grade (P = 0.008) showed significant and independent prognostic importance, whereas subclassification was not found to be significant. CONCLUSIONS Subclassification of papillary thyroid carcinomas had only a minor prognostic impact, whereas histologic grade was a strong and independent prognostic marker. The authors recommend that all papillary carcinomas be given a histologic grade based on a combined examination of nuclear atypia, tumor necrosis, and vascular invasion. [See editorial on pages 1766–68, this issue.] Cancer 2000;88:1902–8. © 2000 American Cancer Society.

Knee arthroplasty in Denmark, Norway and Sweden. A pilot study from the Nordic Arthroplasty Register Association

Abstract: arthroplasty for osteoarthritis, the CRR for all models was also lowest in Sweden, with Denmark and Norway having RRs of 1.7 (CI: 1.4–2.0) and 1.5 (CI: 1.3–1.8), respectively. When only the Oxford implant was analyzed, however, the CRRs were similar and the RRs were 1.2 (CI: 0.9–1.7) and 1.3 (CI: 1.0–1.7). Interpretation We found considerable differences between the 3 countries, with Sweden having a lower revision rate than Denmark and Norway. Further classification and standardization work is needed to permit more elaborate studies.