Is the patient with mesothelioma without hope?

Our plain-English summary of Is the patient with mesothelioma without hope?, by A.P. Maat, R. Cornelissen, A.J. Bogers, et al (Future Oncology, 2015).

The study

• Authors: A.P. Maat, R. Cornelissen, A.J. Bogers, J.J. Takkenberg
• Journal: Future Oncology
• Published: 2015;11(24 Suppl):11-4
• Cited by: 1 article, as counted by NIH iCite
• Read it: PubMed · Publisher

Abstract

Hope is a very important mindset for malignant pleural mesothelioma patients as their cancer has a grim prognosis and limited therapeutic options. In this paper, we briefly discuss what hope means for a patient and how hope can help to cope with this disease. In addition, we discuss false hope. We also briefly touch on a few of the new therapies currently under development.

In plain English

This short commentary discussed hope in patients with malignant pleural mesothelioma (MPM), a cancer the authors described as having a grim prognosis and limited treatment options. It was not a study of patients, and it did not examine asbestos exposure, though it noted that MPM is an occupational disease. The authors wrote that, as far as they knew, how patients cope had not been studied systematically, and that they could find only anecdotal information. To question what they called false hope, they cited an earlier paper in which 21 of 24 patients with sarcomatoid MPM had extensive surgery and median survival was 5.1 months. Citing a personal communication, they wrote that at most 10 to 15% of newly diagnosed patients are candidates to see a thoracic surgeon. They also described their own small Phase I study, submitted separately, in which seven of ten patients given a dendritic cell treatment lived beyond 2 years after diagnosis. The authors concluded that doctors should guide patients toward possibilities without losing a sense of reality. They added that immunotherapy is still at an early experimental stage.

We wrote this plain-English summary from the full article with the help of AI, and a second AI model checked each sentence against the article. It is not the authors' wording; the abstract and the article are their own account.

What the study did and found

• Design: Commentary (opinion piece); not an original study
• Who was studied: No study population; the article discusses patients with malignant pleural mesothelioma in general
• Exposure: No exposure was studied. Asbestos and fiber types are not discussed. The article only notes that MPM is an occupational disease.
• Main results:
  • The authors stated that, as far as they knew, how patients and families cope with an MPM diagnosis had not been reported or studied systematically. They found only anecdotal information on websites and in stories from their own patients.
  • Citing another study (the MARS-1 trial, not this article), the authors noted that median survival was 19.5 months in the group that did not have extrapleural pneumonectomy. They used this to argue that survival estimates of less than 12 months carry little value.
  • Citing an earlier paper by Chirieac (not this article) as an example of false hope: in that paper, 21 of 24 patients with sarcomatoid MPM (18 sarcomatoid type, six desmoplastic type) underwent extirpative surgery. Their median survival was 5.1 months (range 1 to 28 months).
  • Citing a personal communication, the authors wrote that at most 10 to 15% of patients newly diagnosed with MPM are candidates to see a thoracic surgeon.
  • The authors described their own small Phase I study, reported in a separate submitted paper. In that study, seven of ten MPM patients given infusions of their own dendritic cells, activated with MPM tumor lysate, lived beyond 2 years after the diagnosis, with only mild side effects.
  • The authors stated that immunotherapy may hold promise for extending patients' lives but is still in an early experimental phase.
• The authors' conclusion: The authors concluded that patients' hope, and the possibility of long survival, is part of their daily work. They saw their task as guiding patients who are looking for these possibilities without losing a sense of reality.

Topics

The National Library of Medicine indexes this study under subjects our site covers: Lung cancer, Mesothelioma.

Medical terms in this study, explained in our Lexicon: Mesothelioma, Pleural Mesothelioma, Prognosis.

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• Checkpoint inhibitors in mesothelioma: hope for the future? — A. Bibby, N. Maskell (2019)

Browse more research in Future Oncology, or return to medical research.