Individualised therapy of angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors in stable coronary artery disease: overview of the primary results of the PERindopril GENEtic association (PERGENE) study

In patients with stable coronary artery disease (CAD) without overt heart failure, ACE inhibitors are among the most commonly used drugs as these agents have been proven effective in reducing the risk of cardiovascular events. Considerable individual variations in the blood pressure response to ACE inhibitors are observed and as such heterogeneity in clinical treatment effect would be likely as well. Assessing the consistency of treatment benefit is essential for the rational and cost-effective prescription of ACE inhibitors. Information on heterogeneities in treatment effect between subgroups of patients could be used to develop an evidence-based guidance for the installation of ACE-inhibitor therapy. Obviously, therapy should only be applied in those patients who most likely will benefit. Attempts to develop such treatment guidance by using clinical characteristics have been unsuccessful. No heterogeneity in risk reduction by ACE inhibitors has been observed in relation to relevant clinical characteristics. A new approach to such ‘guided-therapy’ could be to integrate more patient-specific characteristics such as the patients’ genetic information. If proven feasible, pharmacogenetic profiling could optimise patients’ benefit of treatment and reduce unnecessary treatment of patients. Cardiovascular pharmacogenetic research of ACE inhibitors in coronary artery disease patients is in a formative stage and studies are limited. The PERGENE study is a large pharmacogenetic substudy of the EUROPA trial, aimed to assess the achievability of pharmacogenetic profiling. We provide an overview of the main results of the PERGENE study in terms of the genetic determinants of treatment benefit and blood pressure response. The main results of the PERGENE study show a pharmacogenetic profile related to the treatment benefit of perindopril identifying responders and non-responders to treatment

Food safety and older people : the Kitchen Life study

Foodborne illness (FBI) is a major public health problem in the UK. Recent increases in cases of listeriosis in older people have focused attention on consumer food-related practices. Previous studies highlight poor relationships between what people know, what they say they do and what they actually do in the kitchen. The aim of the Kitchen Life study was to examine what actually happens in the domestic kitchen to assess whether and how this has the potential to influence food safety in the home. Drawing on a qualitative ethnographic approach, methods included a kitchen tour, photography, observation, video observation, informal interviews and diary methods. Ten households with older people (aged 60+) were recruited across the UK. It was found that trust in the food supply, use of food-labelling (including use-by dates), sensory logics (such as the feel or smell of food) and food waste were factors with the potential to influence risk of foodborne illness. Practices shifted with changing circumstances, including increased frailty, bereavement, living alone, receiving help with care and acquiring new knowledge, meaning that the risk of and vulnerability to foodborne illness is not straightforward.Peer reviewe

Immunotherapy of colorectal cancer: new perspectives after a long path.

Although significant therapeutic improvement has been achieved in the last 10 years, the survival of metastatic colorectal cancer patients remains in a range of 28 to 30 months. Presently, systemic treatment includes combination chemotherapy with oxaliplatin and/or irinotecan together with a backbone of 5-fluorouracil/levofolinate, alone or in combination with monoclonal antibodies to VEGFA (bevacizumab) or EGF receptor (cetuximab and panitumumab). The recent rise of immune checkpoint inhibitors in the therapeutic scenario has renewed scientific interest in the investigation of immunotherapy in metastatic colorectal cancer patients. According to our experience and view, here, we review the immunological strategies investigated for the treatment of this disease, including the use of tumor target-specific cancer vaccines, chemo-immunotherapy and immune checkpoint inhibitors