Human Behavior

These Schools Pay Students to Take Weekly COVID Tests. Should Others Try It? – Education Week

In the hallways of New Orleans schools, students talk about the headphones, video games, or Christmas presents theyre saving up for with an unusual new source of income: cash incentives for the COVID-19 tests they take.

The money theyre budgeting has accrued gradually in their online accounts, $10 a week for every COVID-19 test they take at school. For students whove participated since the beginning of the school year, those accounts could soon hold a few hundred dollars.

Once kids realized this incentive existed, we saw a lot of our kids really pushing their parents to sign the consent form, said Tiffany Delcour, the chief operating officer of New Orleans schools.

Like many other districts, New Orleans has made routine mass virus testing a key part of its COVID-19 precautions. Weekly PCR molecular tests allow administrators to detect sometimes asymptomatic cases, isolating students before they infect their peers. This has helped to cut down on some of the churn of disruptions caused by constant quarantines and classroom closures in schools around the country, Delcour said.

Around the country, schools with such broad testing programs have seen a major hurdle to their efforts: low student participation rates that can weaken their ability to detect the virus and slow its spread.

In some cases, parents dont consent to have their children tested, fearing the interruption to their family life if they test positive. In others, students themselves opt out because of concerns about inconvenience or even the discomfort of sticking a swab in their nostrils to collect a sample.

Thats why some districtsand some state school testing initiativeshave experimented by rewarding students with gift cards, extra recess time, and even cash to encourage more participation.

What weve heard from districts and schools is that COVID fatigue is real, said Leah Perkinson, the manager of the pandemics health team at the Rockefeller Foundation, which has worked with schools, states, and the federal government to grow testing efforts. People are tired, they are frustrated, they are exasperated ... I think incentives are a way to inject some new energy into this space.

While many large school districts have launched some form of virus testing program, Rockefeller does not track how many offer incentives, though Perkinson said the number is likely quite small.

The pandemic has proven how difficult it can be to change human behavior, and public health officials agree that its too early to determine whether incentives for COVID-19 testing will work in every school.

Schools that have embraced the strategy say anything that gets more students on board is worth it, even if participation is still far from universal.

Even as the emergency approval of vaccines for children as young as 5 has brightened the light at the end of the pandemic tunnel, advocates for school testing say its too early to discontinue those efforts.

Many children are not yet vaccinated, precautions like masking are unpopular in many communities, and scientists remain concerned about the emergence of possible more-contagious strains, like the recently detected Omicron variant, which they are still evaluating.

In states like Michigan and New York, governors have called for additional funding for school-based testing as numbers start to rise.

The Biden administration has encouraged broader school testing efforts by setting aside $10 billion in federal aid for such work and by providing additional guidance on how schools can use money from the American Rescue Plan to carry out such work, but such efforts are rare in many parts of the country. Thats in part due to varying state approaches to the pandemic and in part because of the logistical challenges schools face in purchasing testing materials, interrupting class time, and coordinating and tracking regular swabs. In Texas, for example, millions of dollars of money for testing in schools has largely gone untouched, the Dallas Morning News reported.

Some districts, like Los Angeles and New York City, have made participation in regular COVID-19 testing mandatory for in-person learning. But there is not an appetite for such a requirement in many areas, where precautions have become politically divisive.

Support for Schools' COVID-19 Testing Efforts

The Rockefeller Foundation has teamed with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to offer education leaders resources about launching and strengthening school-based COVID-19 testing efforts. Learn more here.

In October, after President Joe Biden urged more school testing as part of a fresh wave of federal efforts, the U.S. Department of Education said in a memo that school districts could use their relief aid to reward families with reasonable incentives, like nominal gift cards, if their students agree to regular screening tests. Schools should also be sure to provide information in languages parents can understand to encourage broad participation and consent, the memo said.

Some states have already introduced incentives into their voluntary plans, which rely on a variety of types of COVID-19 tests . School districts in Colorado and Louisiana can opt into weekly programs, which require separate consent from parents for students to participate and to receive incentives. In exchange for their first test, students in both states get $25 loaded onto an online debit card, and they get $10 for each subsequent weekly test.

But, even with that extra nudge, participation is far from universal in many schools.

Seventy-five Durango, Colo., students signed up to participate when their district began piloting a regular testing program Nov. 1, spokeswoman Julie Popp said. With the help of state-administered incentives, that number grew to 352 students by the end of the month. Thats only about a seventh of the elementary, middle, and high schools combined enrollment, which totals about 2,500 students.

Still, the district has seen value in the program, and it expects participation to continue to grow. Administrators recently decided to roll it out district-wide, Popp said.

Adding serial testing to other efforts, like improved ventilation and universal masking, offers an extra layer of protection, supporting the goal of keeping our schools open and providing a safe and healthy environment for students and staff, she said.

When New Orleans launched its state-administered testing program in August, about 11,000 of the school systems 45,000 students opted in. With the help of incentives and other efforts, that number has grown to about 16,000, Delcour said.

I think there was a fear that if we were testing kids for COVID that we would find more COVID and that would that mean putting more kids in quarantine, she said.

In reality, fewer than 0.05 percent of tests come back positive each week, and schools are able to act quickly to isolate those students and limit disruption.

Educators there also found mass testing particularly helpful after schools closed for two weeks in September in response to Hurricane Ida, leading many students to travel to other states and regions for safety. That testing identified 225 cases, preventing potential classroom outbreaks that could have further disrupted students lives, Delcour said.

Beyond the persuasive power of cash, New Orleans leaders attribute growing testing rates to the hard work of school leaders. In the all-charter school system, some have seen participation rates as high as 80 percent. After consulting principals at the most successful schools, the district made a playbook that recommended verbal communication with parentson calls home, in parent-teacher conferences, and in the school pick-up lineas the most effective tool for building support for testing.

That hard, boots-on-the-ground work is paying off, Delcour said.

Changing human behavior through small actions, known by researchers as nudges, and larger incentives can be more complicated that it seems on the surface, and there can be unforeseen consequences, said Tom Chang an associate professor of finance and business economics at the University of Southern California.

Chang has studied the effectiveness of vaccine incentives and state lotteries, which rewarded millions of dollars to randomly selected recipients of the inoculations to encourage residents to get the jab. His research showed such efforts worked for people who were reluctant but open to getting the shot, but they have had little effect on the most stubborn holdouts, who said they were concerned about unproven claims that the vaccines are not safe.

They are not on the fence thinking about whether they should get vaccinated or not. Thats why incentives and messaging and nudging dont work for them, Chang said. When it comes to testing, I would imagine there are far more people on the fence.

For incentives to be effective, school leaders should make sure they will be received positively and that they wont be viewed as coercive to resistant parents, he said.

Perkinson, of the Rockefeller Foundation, said schools should also ensure they have the capacity to distribute rewards on top of the work of administering tests.

There are a lot of practical challenges in managing an incentive program just like there is in managing a testing program, she said. We are talking about all of these systems changes happening in schools at once.

School leaders should also ensure they are addressing all barriers to testing and ensuring that their approach fits the attitudes of their community, Perkinson said.

In the Hillside, Ill., district, which consists of one school that educates 425 early-childhood through 8th grade children, about 88 percent of students have opted into weekly testing, said Superintendent Kevin Suchinski. He attributes the community buy-in in part to demographics: The vast majority of students are Black and Latino, two communities that have been disproportionately affected by the pandemic.

On Mondays, cohorts of students start lining up in the gym by 8:45 a.m. to spit into tubes used for saliva-based molecular tests, and the whole process wraps up by 10. Athletes and participants in higher-exposure extracurricular activities, like choir, take an additional test on Thursdays, Suchinski said.

The school does not provide financial rewards for testing. Rather, it has incorporated COVID-19 precautions like proper mask wearing and participating in testing into its positive behavior interventions and support system, through which students earn points for good behaviors, like helping a classmate, that can later be traded for small toys, lunch with a teacher, or extra recess time.

That has made testing feel like a part of the schools culture and a way for students to support each other, Suchinski said.

We wanted to teach why it was important to test, we wanted to reinforce it, and we wanted to reward it, he said. We are all in this together.

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These Schools Pay Students to Take Weekly COVID Tests. Should Others Try It? - Education Week

Human Behavior

On the (Show) Road Again – I-Connect007

Much has happened the past two yearspolitically, technically, and sociallythat has greatly changed the path forward from what we had envisioned before the pandemic. Finally, here we are again, on the road between two full, in-person exhibition and technology events, AWE and CES.

How We Got HereAdvances in augmented/virtual reality (XR) hardware are significant but the need for XR is different than what we had envisioned just a few years ago. We still see gaming and entertainment as a driving force, but its future in military, medicine, and service has increased as expected. We did not expect, however, the somewhat sudden and accelerating interest in the meta universe or metaverse. What is the metaverse? Meta means transcendence and verse means universe, so we are approaching the capability of entering a virtual universe that is not reality but does exist outside of reality. What does that mean? Its not just the future of Facebook, although Facebook and other social media sites will play a major role. In my opinion, the metaverse is a combination of the real world that you and those you communicate with occupy, while the XR world is generated by your devices.

Figure 1: A scene from the Augmented World Expo (AWE) in early November. John Hanke from Niantic gave an inspirational keynote about building the metaverse using technology to improve our experiences in the real world by enriching it with fun and magic, and helping people lead more fulfilling lives. Source: AWE Twitter

How will we build this artificial reality? It will be accomplished through XR technology, applying 5G, and 6G cloud transmission technology (which is coming sooner than you think), as well as wearable and viewable supporting hardwaresuch as advanced vision devices, haptics, and all the new hardware that we saw at AWE and expect to see at CES. In fact, such advances have precipitated the need for a second AWE in June 2022.

Expect to hear a lot of talk about the metaverse as this trend grows in sophistication. For now, lets look at some of the XR devices recently announced.

Virtual HeadsetsIt seems that we have moved rapidly from the heavy, wired uncomfortable headsets to lighter headsets that are almost like eyeglasses. At AWE, a company from Finland called Dispelix showed VR glasses that use a thin, transparent waveguide to take in a projected image and relay it to the eye. They are similar in size and comfort of a normal pair of glasses yet have tiny XR projectors at very high image quality.

Niantic, best known for developing Pokmon GO, showcased a software platform called Lightship for building real world metaverse apps that will power future XR glasses. The company announced it will be using the technology at next years Coachella music festival. As I understand it, they will use a visual positioning system for AR glasses. These AR glasses will be embedded with a display that understands its exact real-world position. It then lets virtual objects (such as Pikachu in Pokmon GO) stay anchored to a specific real-world location for you to find when you get there. This is a critical component needed to make AR glasses, such as the kind thatNiantic is building with Qualcomm.

Perhaps the most interesting device I saw at AWE was a pair of smart glasses by Viewpointsystem GmbH, a company based in Vienna. This device is small and comfortable, but it has amazing capability and great potential. I was given the opportunity to interview them and see it work for myself. It first records what you see, then analyzes and determines your expressions, and provides an idea of what youre thinking or doing. This patented process called Eye Gestures mimics a human beings ability to form an opinion about what they observe.

Figure 3: Eye Gestures allows digital interaction in a way that is more intuitive and convenient.

According to company information, The VPS Fact Finder prepares all data from the VPS 19 Smart Glasses for further use. The software visualizes recorded vision and perception. This hardware used with the IMOTIONS software has amazing XR as well as metaverse potential. You gain a holistic view of human behavior and have precise, objective representations of eye sequences as well as the visual behavior of the wearer. There is so much more that this system is capable of. Over the next few years, with the expansion of the metaverse, this type of device may be a key to breaking down the barrier between human and machine. Viewpointsystem will be at CES so we will be looking for more detailed information there.

Other areas of interest included HaptX gloves, which enable very realistic touch and feel; Care AR, a Xerox company enabling service teams to instantly provide remote visual XR support for their customers and field service technicians, including drone collaboration; and other devices including some very high-end VR glasses by Lenovo.

Looking Ahead to CESCES dwarfs AWE, APEX and so many other shows, but expect it to be about half its normal size and somewhat different for 2022. There will still be more than 1,600 exhibitors, with more than a third of them Fortune 500 companies. The best part is its in person and I plan to be there. Here is some of what I expect to see.

Figure 4: The last time CES met in person was 2020.

New Smart PhonesSamsung has released its new line of phones, including something I have misseda modern version of last decades foldable phone. I miss the easily carried flip phone, but I do not want to give up all the features of a modern smartphone. It looks like Samsungs Galaxy Z Fold3 and Galaxy Z Flip3 may be a step in that direction, and I expect new designs at CES, both with smartphones and smart watches.

AutomotiveWe should see everything from portable device fast chargers to advanced heads up displays, transparent technology (allowing the driver to have an unobstructed view of the surroundings of the vehicle from whatever angle is required), advanced dash cams, navigation, entertainment, and, of course, all the technology for the upcoming new electric vehicles including new advanced cars themselves.

Figure 6: Features in electric cars will be a highlight of CES.

Windows 11Microsofts latest operating system is out and many of us on the MS inside track are using it, although it will be available to everyone in early 2022. I expect all new computers and devices shown at CES this year will be Windows 11 compatible. Do we need Windows 11? My initial response is, not really. It has some new features but most of them could easily have been part of a Windows 10 update. It is, however, a good excuse to do a clean OS install. Some of the neat features include a new OS repair tool that finds and fixes OS errors on your computer quickly and automatically; a new widgets feature; new wallpapers and themes; the enhanced and simplified start menu; an enhanced search feature that will help you find recently used apps, files, and pictures quickly and easily; and an upcoming compatibility with Android apps, auto HDR, and more.

There is also what appears to be significant backward compatibility, making the transition quite painless. There are some bugs and there have already been a few updates and fixes. So far, I like it. Unless youre comfortable setting up a computer from scratch, lets wait until CES to hear more.

New GPUs

Over the past year, NVIDIA and AMD have introduced a new generation of graphic processing units (GPUs). The new generation is so powerful that the use of scalable link interface (SLI), which allows the use of more than one GPU on a computer, has almost gone away. The new generation are not that much more expensive if you can get them at list price, which right now you cant. GPUs and their powerful processing capabilities are also used for cryptocurrency mining, thus the demand for GPUs has increased exponentially. This has created a shortage and led to scammers selling them on average for almost double the price.

We are also looking forward to seeing new offerings from the approximate 185 automotive exhibitors; Samsung, Sony, LG, and other smart home exhibitors; all the amazing advanced new ideas and devices at Eureka Park (perhaps the most exciting area); and so much more, including the annual Showstoppers event.

Stay tuned as we bring you highlights during and after the show. There is much to look forward to in a (hopefully) post-pandemic 2022.

Dan Feinberg is an I-Connect007 technical editor and founder of Fein-Line Associates.

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On the (Show) Road Again - I-Connect007

Human Behavior

Pandemic toll nears 800,000, as Delta rages and Omicron threatens – JD Supra

The coronavirus pandemic is nearing another grim mark: 800,000 deaths in this country in its two-year run, with 1 in 100 of the fatalities occurring among those 65 and older.

The pandemic toll exceeds the population of cities like Washington, D.C., Seattle, Denver, Boston, and Memphis, and is heading toward the equivalent of spots like Charlotte and Fort Worth. The virus for some time now has proven to be deadlier than the military casualties the country experienced combined in World War II plus the Vietnam and Korean wars.

Still, millions of shoppers are cramming into stores and malls seeking seasonal bargains and gift-giving wonders. Tens of millions of travelers are ready to jump into cars, trains, buses, and planes for holiday and year-end journeys, to gather with friends and family.

Amid the bright lights and festive whirl, though, will the nation show an exhaustion with protective measures against the long coronavirus pandemic and will a worrisome winter turn into weeks or months more of death and dire illness for all too many?

Research clarifying Omicron perils

Pandemic uncertainty prevails. Experts have shared glimmers of better news, though, about Omicron, the latest and disconcerting coronavirus variant. It appears to spread fast and wide, though limited data suggests this viral strain may cause a milder illness.

Vaccine makers also are reporting that Omicron has mutated in ways that may reduce the effectiveness of existing shots against it. At the same time, though, it also appears from early research that boosters bring up present vaccines protection against the variant to high levels.

This has convinced even many doubters about boosters, so they are now more robustly endorsed by experts.

Federal regulators who earlier expanded the eligibility to all vaccinated patients 18 and older for a third dose of the Pfizer and Moderna product after six months or a second dose after two months of another vaccine (Pfizer or Moderna) or of the Johnson & Johnson shot lowered the booster recommended age. They now say it can be given safely and with excellent effect to previously vaccinated patients who are ages 16 and 17.

Experts have strongly encouraged those 50 and older to get boosters, pronto.

Vaccination demand, which had been sluggish, at best, and perhaps even stalled for months, has risen in recent days causing challenges to providers, particularly pharmacies. But, after seeing a rush for kids ages 5 to 12 to receive coronavirus vaccinations, the pediatric rates have slowed, especially for adolescents.

As of Dec. 10, federal officials reported that more than 200 million Americans are fully vaccinated and that almost 52 million have gotten boosters.

An unrelenting Delta assault

At the same time, as vaccinations take a central role in the battle against Omicron, it is the Delta variant that is savaging swaths of the country, causing patient surges mostly of the unvaccinated that are swamping hospitals and health systems with states in the Northeast and Great Lakes area slammed now.

After weeks of declines, following a brutal summer of the fourth and Delta variant-driven pandemic surge, cases are spiking and so, too, are deaths. Officials report 120,000 cases on average are now occurring daily, a 38% increase, while hospitalizations have jumped to an average of 64,000 daily. The country is reporting more than 1,200 deaths a day, on average.

Hospitals in four states Maine, New Hampshire, Indiana, and New York are struggling so much with the current coronavirus wave that officials have mobilized National Guard assistance.

A lethal political calculus

Still, the politically partisan and virulent resistance only grows to various steps to quell the pandemic, especially requirements for people to get vaccinated. NPR has reported how an array of GOP personalities and operatives including those notorious for their careers in spreading wild disinformation have aligned themselves with fact-free extremists opposed to evidence-based science and modern medicine, particularly vaccines.

The bizarre Republican strategy of allowing the coronavirus pandemic to rage and then blaming Democrats and Biden for this is confounding but real: 40% of those telling opinion surveyors they are party backers also are refusing vaccinations. The more heavily that a given county voted for former President Trump, news media analyses show, the lower their vaccination rates and they, as a result, have substantially higher coronavirus deaths and cases.

The unvaccinated, federal officials report from their research, are at 14 times greater risk of dying from the coronavirus than those who have gotten their shots.

Experts estimate that 163,000 of the U.S. coronavirus deaths between June and November of this year alone were preventable by safe and effective vaccines (see figure, above)

We are not done with the coronavirus and the huge trauma it has inflicted on us all. Please get tested, if appropriate, AND get vaccinated, AND get those booster shots. Officials are trying to make it as easy and convenient, as possible and its free. If youre uncertain about getting a booster or optimizing your mixing and matching of coronavirus shots, talk to your doctor, pronto. And, while youre at it, ask about and get your annual flu shot.

We cannot ignore disease and death and embrace nihilism and fatalism. We cannot allow anti-science fanatics to destroy centuries of progress with the viral spread of ever-wilder fantasies and conspiracies. Our health system, the envy of the world, cannot be a toy that will be smashed and ruined by selfish belligerence. Here are wise words to be heeded from Francis Collins, the respected and retiring leader of the National Institutes of Health (and an elite researcher who has argued that religious faith and science can and must coexist):

I do think we need to understand better how in the current climate people make decisions. I dont think I anticipated the degree to which the tribalism of our current society would actually interfere with abilities to size up medical information and make the kinds of decisions that were going to help people. To have now 60 million people still holding off of taking advantage of lifesaving vaccines is pretty unexpected. It does make me, at least, realize, Boy, there are things about human behavior that I dont think we had invested enough into understanding.

We basically have seen the accurate medical information overtaken, all too often, by the inaccurate conspiracies and false information on social media. Its a whole other world out there. We used to think that if knowledge was made available from credible sources, it would win the day. Thats not happening now.

We can quell the coronavirus and we must do so before it mutates again in ways that can be even more disastrous.

Originally posted here:
Pandemic toll nears 800,000, as Delta rages and Omicron threatens - JD Supra

Human Behavior

North Andover Support Services director talks mental health, the pandemic and the holidays – Wicked Local

Lincoln to North Andover on the Bay Circuit Trail

Four fast friends hike the Bay Circuit Trail part 4

Scott C. Smith, Photos courtesy of Rich & Sue Harbert

In addition to joyful Christmas carols, family gatherings and festive light displays, the holiday season tends to bring some unwanted deliveries like depression, anxiety and other challenges to mental health to some.

And this year, the usual holiday blues are met with an ongoing pandemic that has ravaged the nations resources and laid bare the needs of our mental health system.

There have been a lot more really significant needs than we could have anticipated and a much greater demand than I think anybody anticipated, North Andover Community Support Director Deanna Lima said.

The towns Community Support Department housed in the North Andover Police Department headquarters on Osgood Street and lead by Lima and supported by Case Manager Crystal Clunie was initially conceived by former Selectman Phil DeCologero as a tool in the battle against opioid addiction in town.

But Limas role has been a baptism by fire, literally. When she started, the Columbia Gas explosions had the town in a state of devastation and fear.

And as that situation was winding down, the COVID-19 pandemic emerged to further test the mettle of the 375-year-old community.

Initially, it was the chaos, the fear and the unknown, so it was people needing information, reassurance, guidance, Lima recalled. And very quickly, it moved into people needing basic needs, which is how we got to open the food bank and help folks with food, household supplies, getting connected to resources being provided in the community.

That was the first year. As the pandemic aged into 2021, we started to see the breadth of psychological, social and emotional impact the pandemic has had.

People started to exhibit signs of anxiety, depression, and at that point people had been quarantining and isolating for a long time, so using other means of coping that arent necessarily health, like alcohol and other substances, indulging in behaviors that arent healthy. And the effects of that catch up, Lima said.

Indeed, the addiction epidemic that dominated headlines before COVID-19 has only worsened in its wake, with addicts unable to attend in-person counseling and support meetings and the isolation of quarantine creating scores of new addicts in need of help.

After that first year, year and a half, the need has become social and emotional support. And people dont always know that thats what they need, dont know how to ask for that, dont feel comfortable asking for that, so that need manifests itself in a lot of different ways, Lima continued.

And often it manifests itself in challenging behaviors. You see kids acting out, you see adults acting out," Lima concluded. "Thats what we continue to see is the ongoing stress that the pandemic has had on folks, and people really adjusting to a new normal.

And the pre-pandemic problems that created the need for her position especially addiction and the issues it brings require even more attention than before in that new normal.

Theres less access to treatment because of the pandemic, and definitely far more barriers, Lima said. The social support that is critical to success in treatment has been decreased by the pandemic.

While some have adapted to virtual support groups and online therapy, others have not. And Lima said a big challenge with addressing addiction during the pandemic has been the normalization of substance abuse over the past 21 months.

You see it on social media quite frequently, its very prevalent, the use of alcohol and all kinds of substances, Lima said.

To mitigate holiday season anxiety and depression during the ongoing stress of the COVID-19 pandemic, Lima suggests managing expectations.

People tend to imagine and stick to ideas on how they want holiday photos and parties to be, how they want kids to behave, how much they can spend on gifts, and more. But reality, especially this year, will always beg to differ.

You have to be realistic about what can happen, Lima said. Were in a very different time right now, and celebrations arent going to look how they used to look, and people arent going to have the same responses that they once did, so you have to be realistic about those things. Human behavior is difficult to manage, so you cant expect more than what is reasonable, especially from children and folks who are disregulated anyway.

And with the political climate of the past year, politics is bound to come up in many family discussions. Lima suggests avoiding confrontation and being open and honest about our own comfort and limits when it comes to political talk.

Most people have someone in their family or social circle that triggers them and gets them excited, and its important that we learn how to disengage from conversations and discussions that are triggering, but in a healthy way, Lima said. Its important to model that for children and for others, to say Its OK that our opinions differ, I would rather not discuss this, or This isnt the time or place. But acknowledge it. Dont pretend that it doesnt exist.

Anyone in the community who needs help navigating services can reach out to the North Andover Community Services Department via the town website, and the department has a Facebook page as well.

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North Andover Support Services director talks mental health, the pandemic and the holidays - Wicked Local

Embryology

Demystifying IVF: Everything You Need To Know (Including Chances Of Success) – Momtastic

IVF can be overwhelming, and thats certainly true at first. When I started on my fertility treatment journey I didnt know the first thing about IVF. Basically all I knew was that it involved injecting myself with hormones, which is why when it became clear that I needed it all I did was cry and cry and cry out of fear! Of course its easy for me to say it wasnt as bad as I feared now that I have my son, but the truth is that while the needles may not have been as bad as I feared (and certainly not as bad as all the blood tests!), it was one of the toughest things Ive ever done in my life.

I wish I was better informed when I started about my chances of success (I was told Id be pregnant by the Jewish holidays the next month, meanwhile it took over three years for my successful pregnancy).

Given that fertility struggles affect so many of us I turned toClaire ONeill, who foundedFertilitySpace in 2020 with the aim of using fertility industry data to help women find the best fertility provider for their unique goals and make informed decisions while navigating the world of fertility treatment, to outline everything people on this journey need to know.

There are guidelines that the American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) recommends for women who are struggling to conceive for when to go in for testing with a reproductive endocrinologist, which is a fertility specialist.

Fertility declines with age, so how soon to seek out an opinion from a fertility doctor depends on how old you are and how long youve been unsuccessful in trying to get pregnant.

Fertility testing with a reproductive endocrinologist is recommended after:

Same-sex female couples, same-sex male couples, and single parents by choice who wish to have a biological child should reach out immediately to a reproductive endocrinologist at a fertility clinic so that they can begin the process of building their family.

It can take some time to find a sperm/egg donor or even longer to find a gestational surrogate, so the sooner you can get started on this process, the better.

The most well-known fertility treatment is IVF. Its certainly more invasive and more expensive than the other two options, but also comes with a much higher chance of pregnancy from just one treatment cycle.

In IVF, the main difference is where the sperm and egg will be when fertilization happens. In the timed intercourse and IUI, fertilization would occur within the body like normal but in IVF, multiple eggs will actually be retrieved from your ovaries and fertilized in a dish in the embryology lab.

The primary type of medications you take for an IVF cycle are called gonadotropins and will cause multiple follicles to begin developing in your ovaries. The goal of IVF is to try to recruit multiple follicles so that you can attempt to fertilize multiple eggs in one round.

Not every egg leads to a baby, some eggs dont fertilize and others dont end up developing into a viable embryo. Because of this, your doctor tries to maximize your chance of success from IVF by retrieving as many eggs as possible.

The process of IVF takes about 2-3 weeks. We created an IVF timeline on FertilitySpace so that you can see what the typical steps are as part of those few weeks.

You will begin taking fertility medications which are mostly in the form of injections subcutaneously into your belly or intramuscularly into your glute muscle. The number of days you need to take fertility medications varies based on how your ovaries respond but its typical to take them for about 10 days.

During this time youll be going in for regular monitoring appointments where your doctor is tracking the growth of your follicles. Once the lead follicle is large enough, its time to take the trigger shot. You usually take the trigger shot at night and your egg retrieval is scheduled about 36 hours later, so it will take place in the early morning.

On the day of your egg retrieval, either your partner will be scheduled to produce a semen sample or a frozen vial of donor/partner sperm will be thawed. The sample is processed by an andrologist to remove any sperm that arent moving and leave only the sperm that are motile.

Once your doctor has completed the egg retrieval, an embryologist counts the number of eggs you have. At this point the eggs can be fertilized with the sperm. There are actually two different ways to do this. One is by what we call standard insemination and the other is called ICSI, which stands for intracytoplasmic sperm injection.

In standard insemination, the eggs and sperm are placed in a dish overnight so that the sperm can swim to an egg and fertilize it.

In ICSI, an embryologist actually selects a sperm and injects it into the egg in order to fertilize it. This is often done in cases where there is a male factor infertility or if women are using previously frozen eggs.

The embryologist then checks the next day to see how many eggs were fertilized. The eggs that have fertilized are incubated and watched for about 5 to 6 days to see how well they develop.

On Day 5 or 6 of embryo development, your doctor will work with the embryology team to choose which embryo has the best chance of resulting in a healthy baby. They do this by evaluating which had the best rate of development, the best morphological grade, and in cases where the embryos were genetically tested, they also choose based on which embryos have the correct number of chromosomes needed for life.

At this point, an embryo can be transferred back into your uterus and two weeks later, youll be able to take a pregnancy test to find out if youre pregnant. You also have the option of freezing embryos and doing a transfer in the future to try to get pregnant.

Hard to believe its all done in the space of about 3 weeks but theres often a lot of preparation that comes in advance and during treatment, it can feel a lot longer.

Your chance of getting pregnant from an IVF cycle depends on so many factors but a big one if your age. Some women will get pregnant from just one IVF cycle and even have a second child from an embryo she froze in the cycle as well, while others may need to undergo multiple IVF cycles in order to conceive. IVF is not a guarantee but it does help many couples have a baby.

The most recent national IVF data from the CDC reported that women less than 35 years old had a 52.7% success rate with IVF and declined steadily into a womans late 30s with women older than 40 having a 7.9% success rate when using their own eggs.

If women are unsuccessful with IVF due to an age-related decline in egg quality, they still have options. Many women circumvent this issue by using donor eggs which have a success rate of roughly 50% per transfer. Donor eggs are from much younger, healthy women and can allow women who are older with poor egg quality to successfully carry a pregnancy.

If youre interested in looking into what your chance of success with IVF might be, you can view IVF success rates for clinics in your area at FertilitySpace.

You can also read reviews from past patients and reach out to a clinic to schedule a consultation with one of their fertility doctors to see what your options are, discuss what treatment would make sense for you, and what your individual chance of conception looks like for each treatment option.

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Embryology

RMA of New York Opens State-of-the-Art IVF Laboratory in Brooklyn, expanding access to fertility care to New York’s most populous county – PRNewswire

For the past 10 years, RMA of New York had served the Brooklyn community at a satellite office in downtown Brooklyn. The opening of this new, full-service center, enhanced with an onsite state-of-the-art IVF laboratory, allows Brooklyn residents to meet all of their fertility needs in one location. Accessibility is a key component to positive patient experiences and successful outcomes, since fertility treatment often involves frequent or even daily visits to the office.

RMA of New York founding partner Dr. Alan Copperman commented, "We are committed to providing exceptional, accessible, and inclusive fertility care to communities in Brooklyn and the surrounding area. By practicing personalized and precise reproductive medicine, I am confident that we will replicate the high success rates we have achieved for two decades at our Manhattan location, and that we will be able to help an entire community of people access care locally and fulfill their family building dreams."

RMA of New York consistently delivers high IVF success rates and is globally recognized as a leader in the field of reproductive medicine and assisted reproductive technology. Personalized, precision medicine and clinical excellence have been hallmark characteristics of RMA of New York for the past 20 years.

Medical Director Dr. Jovana Lekovich, alongside reproductive endocrinology and infertility specialists Dr. Tia Jackson-Bey and Dr. Jenna Friedenthal, will care for patients at the Brooklyn location. With decades of experience among them, they will offer patients a personalized reproductive treatment plan that will meet individualized family-building goals.

Dr. Lekovich emphasized, "We are opening our doors to individuals and couples who come from a wide range of backgrounds, ethnicity, sexual orientations, and cultures, but who share a dream of parenthood.We will combine scientific excellence and compassionate care and do everything in our power to make those dreams come true."

This team of top fertility experts will provide patients with a full range of on-site fertility care from low-tech treatments, such as intrauterine insemination (IUI), to the latest advanced assisted reproductive techniques, such as in vitro fertilization (IVF) and preimplantation genetic testing (PGT). Fertility preservation treatment programs will now be more accessible with the new state-of-the-art lab that will also provide on-site egg and sperm freezing, and long term storage.

With four offices in Manhattan, three in the Hudson Valley at RMANY at CareMount, and six on Long Island at RMALIIVF, RMA of New York's new Brooklyn location demonstrates a sustained commitment of the organization to provide fertility care to the region. RMA of New York, in partnership with the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology, and Reproductive Medicine at The Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, is committed to using genomic medicine, big data, and multi-scale biology to personalize care and improve patient outcomes.

About Reproductive Medicine Associates of New York (RMA of New York)

RMA of New York is widely recognized as a global leader in state-of-the-art reproductive medicine, and serves as the Division of Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Led by an integrated team of physicians and scientists with extensive reproductive endocrinology, infertility, and embryology training, RMA of New York is renowned for its pioneering research in the field and for delivering high IVF success rates. For the past 20 years, the physicians of RMA of New York have consistently been distinguished as "Top Doctors" by Castle Connolly and New York Magazine, as well as Super Doctors. Headquartered in midtownManhattan, RMA ofNew Yorkhas fertility clinic locations throughoutManhattan, Brooklyn,Westchester, Long Island, and abroad inMexico City. For more information, please visitwww.rmany.com.

Contact: Pamela Pearlman 212-756-5777 [emailprotected]

SOURCE Reproductive Medicine Associates of New York

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RMA of New York Opens State-of-the-Art IVF Laboratory in Brooklyn, expanding access to fertility care to New York's most populous county - PRNewswire

Embryology

Argentine bishops want people to hear the pope, not about the pope – Crux Now

ROME Even though the papacy isnt a popularity contest, a popes influence in his home country is one way to measure how hes doing. Alas, when it comes to Pope Franciss Argentina, things are a bit more complicated: According to the local bishops, Argentines hear about the pope, but they dont actually hear him.

According to a 2020 poll by the National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET), nine in ten Argentines affirm that their religiosity did not increase after the election of historys first pope from the global south. Furthermore, 40 percent of Argentines are completely indifferent to the pope, and within this number, 32 percent of those who answered identify as Catholic. And 27 percent of the people think hes too involved in politics instead of spiritual affairs.

Seeing these numbers, it comes as no surprise that the head of the Argentine bishops conference, Bishop Oscar Ojea of San Isidro, believes that two of the six challenges the local church faces for the coming years involve Pope Francis and his magisterium:

Speaking about the Synod, which includes a two-year consultation process at a parish, diocesan, national and regional levels before the actual Synod of Bishops on synodality, to be held in Rome in Oct. 2023, Ojea said that with it, The Church goes out to listen in a world of deaf ears, in which each group listens to its own discourse. Before the proposal of the Synod there are different reactions and fears.

As president of the Argentine bishops, he said, I have clearly seen sectors of a secularized mentality, very entrenched in some media outlets, that do not hesitate to use disinformation, slander and defamation to attack the Church, seeking to expel it from the public space.

On the other hand, he argued, there is a religious fundamentalism that does not respect the freedom of others and feeds forms of intolerance and violence, longing for a church that imposes power.

These two sectors, according to Ojea, have much economic and media power, and in Argentina, they have joined together, like Pharisees and Sadducees, to systematically denigrate the church through the figure of Pope Francis, who has deserved the respect and consideration of most of the peoples of the world, near or far from the church, over these nine years of his pontificate.

In his own country, the bishop pointed out, these groups have become a major obstacle for Pope Francis to be read directly and thus his teachings reach the faithful. Instead, our people have heard more opinions and qualifications about him than what he expresses through his words and writings.

We must continually unmask these two extremes, without allowing ourselves to be defeated by a secularism that worldlyizes the church or by a fundamentalism that prevents it from enculturating itself and properly reading the signs of the times, Ojea said.

On the matter of clerical sexual abuse, the president of the Argentine bishops said: We must not give in to any kind of cover-up. We have to be very firm in this determination. We bishops, in these situations, carry a real cross. We must first of all protect the victims, recognize that although there are some false allegations, the vast majority of the allegations are true and this should concern us, occupy us and invite us to deepen in a reorganization of the ecclesial structure.

He pointed out that protecting children, preventing abuse, and helping survivors is a task for the entire Church, called to confront the weight of a culture impregnated with clericalism inherited from its history.

Ojea also spoke of the need to fight all forms of abuse, including those of power, financial nature and conscience.

Speaking about gender ideology, the prelate said that on this matter, it is important for the laity to be formed, because in a certain sense, we have found ourselves surprised in the mist of a very fast cultural change.

It is possible to distinguish without separating, the biological sex from the sociocultural role of sex, Ojea said. Gender ideology instead distinguishes sex and gender by separating them and thus preventing a harmonious relationship of all aspects of the human person.

Pope Francis has referred to this issue in several opportunities throughout his pontificate, calling it a global war against the family. Last year, speaking about where he sees evil in a book about Pope John Paul II, he said that one place is gender theory. Right away I want to clarify that I am not referring to people with a homosexual orientation. The Catechism of the Catholic Church invites us to accompany them and provide pastoral care to these brothers and sisters of ours.

Gender theory, he said, has a dangerous cultural aim of erasing all distinctions between men and women, male and female, which would destroy at its roots Gods most basic plan for human beings: Diversity, distinction. It would make everything homogenous, neutral. It is an attack on difference, on the creativity of God and on men and women.

RELATED: He was a great, Pope Francis says of St. John Paul II

Francis said he did not want to discriminate against anyone, but was convinced that human peace and well-being had to be based on the reality that God created people with differences and that accepting not ignoring those differences is what brings people together.

When it comes to the Argentine bishops, Ojea said that we prefer to adopt a gender perspective. Gender ideology instead thinks of gender as a fluid and self-constructed reality independent of biology so that ones identity could be designed according to the autonomous desire of each person.

The prelate also said that all persons must be treated according to their equal dignity, and on this regard, we cannot deny that our history bears traces of a patriarchal history in which the equal dignity of males and females has not been recognized in practice and we see that here a profound change is necessary.

Ojea said the bishops conference sees the imposition of gender ideology on all educational projects, ignoring the freedom of parents and educational institutions, is also part of the sixth challenge they foresee for upcoming years.

On the fourth challenge, the defense of life, Ojea said that sometimes, the Catholic Church is accused of being anti-rights and that by being against abortion and same-sex marriage, the Church is putting these in the same bag with violence against women.

We must make it clear that we are not anti-rights because in the first place we defend the right of every mother and every unborn child, that is, the right of all, without excluding anyone, he said. We must always strongly affirm our most resounding rejection of all types of violence, especially that which is exercised against the most vulnerable, women and children.

Abortion on demand in the first 14 weeks of gestation was legalized in Argentina in December. In the videos, Ojea says he spoke about the matter with Pope Francis back in January, when the two met at the Vatican. During that conversation, the pontiff urged the bishop to find creative ways to continue underlining the importance of life, and the fact that it is science and embryology books that prove that life begins at conception.

On the first challenge, that of being a missionary Church, he said it comes directly from Francis programmatic letter, Evangelii Gaudium, published in 2013, where he wrote: I dream of a missionary option capable of transforming everything.

The immediate context of the pandemic has left deep traces of anger, sadness, disillusionment and fear, Ojea said. All these shards left by the pandemic cannot be evaluated conveniently because of the proximity in time. This missionary outreach of our Church faces this reality and this context.

Follow Ins San Martn on Twitter:@inesanma

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Argentine bishops want people to hear the pope, not about the pope - Crux Now

Embryology

The ethical pitfalls of company-sponsored egg freezing – UCAN

In recent years, elective egg freezing by single women to preserve their fertility without medical reason commonly referred to as social egg freezing has gained much popularity worldwide. To date, this procedure is banned in only a handful of countries such as Singapore and China, where there is much ongoing debate to permit it.

The high costs of the procedure make it inaccessible to many younger single women with fewer savings, but with optimal egg quality for successful freezing. Hence some big corporations have stepped in to provide egg freezing benefits to their female employees for example, tech giants such as Apple, Facebook and Google.

Nevertheless, corporate sponsorship of egg freezing may be a violation of good medical ethics, in particular with regards to patient autonomy. This is in fact a key foundational cornerstone of biomedical ethics and can be broadly defined as the right of patients to make key medical decisions involving themselves, in accordance with one's own values, reasons, and motives, without undue influence and coercive pressure from another person or organization.

This is of particular significance for elective medical procedures involving substantial risks to patients, such as social egg freezing. Although unnecessary for the sustenance of either life or health, patients are exposed to substantial risks during egg freezing. For example, besides invasive surgery for egg extraction, patients can also potentially develop ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome (OHS), a medical condition where the body overreacts to injected hormones, the severe form of which may be life-threatening.

It can be argued that company sponsorship of egg freezing is unethical because it interferes with the patients autonomous decision-making process to undergo elective egg freezing without a valid medical reason while incurring substantial risks to herself. This is completely unlike employee medical benefits for the treatment of life or health-threatening conditions, which is involuntary and not the result of personal choice.

In a recent post that was published on Womens Forum Australia, it was stated that by normalizing and incorporating the practice as an employee benefit into workplace culture, it is not unreasonable to expect that this could create a more subtle pressure on women to take up the offer.

Added to such concerns is the fact that employers have a conflict of interest in delaying women from having children, as it keeps them in the workforce and is arguably more economically viable than other family-friendly work policies.

Worryingly, there may be an unwritten rule that if egg freezing benefits are available, then female employees are expected to utilize them to delay childbearing, rather than take maternity leave; or else they will not be promoted or be the first to be laid off if the opportunity arises.

A company offering to sponsor elective egg freezing for their female employees is akin to enticing and abetting them to undergo this risky procedure without a valid medical reason, thereby exerting some degree of undue influence on their decision-making process.

Moreover, the act of sponsoring egg freezing may be tantamount to encouraging and abetting false hope of future motherhood with this elective procedure, due to its low success rates. The American Society of Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) reported that the pregnancy success rate is relatively low, at around two percent to 12 percent per frozen egg.

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Similarly, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority of the United Kingdom reported that only about one in five IVF treatment cycles were successful with a patients own frozen eggs. The uncertainty of future conception with social egg freezing may be further aggravated by the late age at which the majority of career women freeze their eggs, typically in their mid-thirties to early forties.

In future, if female employees are unable to conceive with their frozen eggs, could their employers be held accountable for encouraging and abetting them to freeze their eggs via company fringe benefits?

Indeed, as bioethics professor Heidi Mertes wrote: Egg freezing is often misleadingly portrayed as an insurance policy instead of a last resort. Each frozen egg cell represents a small chance of a healthy live birth, and those chances decline fast after a womans 35th birthday. Rather than an insurance policy, women are instead buying lottery tickets. If they buy a lot of tickets (that is, if they are able to bank a large number of good quality egg cells), they have a reasonable chance of success, but uncertainty is a fundamental feature of the system. Facebook and Apple are therefore investing in a false sense of security. They are certain to get a return on that investment, but are their employees?

Mertes also stated that company-sponsored egg freezing created a situation whereby women "owe" their employers. For example, a single woman who freezes her eggs at age 30 and bumps into Mr. Right the next day may want to embark on parenthood the year after. Will she be free from outside pressure to go ahead, or will the frozen eggs be regarded by both parties (employer and employee) as an addendum to the employment contract in which the employee has promised not to get pregnant in the first few years to follow? Also, what happens when she changes jobs?

Lawyer Lauren Geisser postulated that instead of refashioning the corporate norms of female employees sacrificing their youth and peak childbearing years for their employers, companies may find it in their best interest to offer egg freezing sponsorship at the expense of finding a long-term solution to sustaining long-term work-life balance and equality in the workplace.

Hence, corporate sponsorship of social egg freezing would implicitly assume that women will continue to bear the brunt of childcare and that the workplace will continue to be incompatible with pregnancy and motherhood, thus providing an empty solution of deferring childbirth via egg freezing.

Similar views were voiced by the journalist Nitasha Tiku, who wrote that women may feel pressured to use the egg freezing benefit to delay childbearing, just like everyone feels pressured to always be on call to the office, always check email, always have a smartphone in hand. If such coercive pressure exists, then this would be a clear violation of the patients autonomous decision-making process.

As such, company sponsorship of egg freezing should be viewed as a trespass on a patients autonomous decision-making process, thus contravening good medical ethics, and should therefore be strictly regulated or even prohibited by health authorities worldwide.

Dr. Alexis Heng Boon Chin is an associate professor of biomedical science at Peking University, China. He previously worked in the field of human clinical assisted reproduction research in Singapore and has authored 50 international journal publications on ethical and legal issues relating to new reproductive technologies in addition to publishing more than 250 scientific journal articles. The views in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official editorial position of UCANews.

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For the last 40 years, UCA News has remained the most trusted and independent Catholic news and information service from Asia. Every week, we publish nearly 100 news reports, feature stories, commentaries, podcasts and video broadcasts that are exclusive and in-depth, and developed from a view of the world and the Church through informed Catholic eyes.

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Cell Biology

Outlook on the Cell Isolation Global Market to 2026 – by Technique, Cell Type, Product, Application, End-use and Region – ResearchAndMarkets.com -…

DUBLIN--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The "Cell Isolation Market: Global Industry Trends, Share, Size, Growth, Opportunity and Forecast 2021-2026" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering.

The global cell isolation market exhibited strong growth during 2015-2020. Looking forward, the publisher expects the market to grow at a CAGR of around 17% during 2021-2026.

Companies Mentioned

Keeping in mind the uncertainties of COVID-19, we are continuously tracking and evaluating the direct as well as the indirect influence of the pandemic on different end-use sectors. These insights are included in the report as a major market contributor.

Cell isolation, or separation, refers to the process of identifying and removing one or more specific cells from a heterogeneous mixture of cell population. The targeted cells are identified, isolated and separated according to their type. Some commonly used methods for cell isolation include magnet-activated cell separation, filtration, centrifugation and flow cytometry. Cell isolation is also used to diagnose diseases, cellular research and therapies by analyzing the ribonucleic acid (RNA) expressions. It aids in minimizing experimental complexity while analyzing the cells and reducing the interference from other cell types within the sample. As a result, it finds extensive application in cancer research, stem cell biology, immunology and neurology.

Significant growth in the medical and pharmaceutical industries is one of the key factors creating a positive outlook for the market. Furthermore, increasing emphasis on cell-based research is providing a thrust to the market growth. Researchers actively utilize isolated cells to develop novel cell therapies and cell-based treatments for various chronic medical ailments. Pharmaceutical manufacturers are also widely using cell isolation technologies to improve drug discovery and develop drugs with enhanced efficacies. In line with this, the increasing requirement for personalized medicines is also contributing to the growth of the market.

Additionally, the development of advanced separation tools for proteins, nucleic acids, chromatin and other complex cells for subsequent analysis is also contributing to the growth of the market. Other factors, including extensive research and development (R&D) activities in the field of biotechnology, along with the implementation of favorable government policies, are anticipated to drive the market toward growth.

Competitive Landscape:

The competitive landscape of the industry has also been examined along with the profiles of the key players being Alfa Laval AB, Becton Dickinson and Company, Beckman Coulter Inc. (Danaher Corporation), Bio-Rad Laboratories Inc., General Electric Company, Merck KGaA, Miltenyi Biotec B.V. & Co. KG, pluriSelect Life Science UG (haftungsbeschrankt) & Co. KG, Roche Holding AG, STEMCELL Technologies Inc., Terumo Corporation and Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc.

Key Questions Answered in This Report:

Key Topics Covered:

1 Preface

2 Scope and Methodology

3 Executive Summary

4 Introduction

4.1 Overview

4.2 Key Industry Trends

5 Global Cell Isolation Market

5.1 Market Overview

5.2 Market Performance

5.3 Impact of COVID-19

5.4 Market Forecast

6 Market Breakup by Technique

7 Market Breakup by Cell Type

8 Market Breakup by Product

9 Market Breakup by Application

10 Market Breakup by End Use

11 Market Breakup by Region

12 SWOT Analysis

13 Value Chain Analysis

14 Porters Five Forces Analysis

15 Price Analysis

16 Competitive Landscape

16.1 Market Structure

16.2 Key Players

16.3 Profiles of Key Players

For more information about this report visit https://www.researchandmarkets.com/r/b2ndjc

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Outlook on the Cell Isolation Global Market to 2026 - by Technique, Cell Type, Product, Application, End-use and Region - ResearchAndMarkets.com -...

Cell Biology

Colorectal Cancer Patients May Have More Drug Options With Systems Approach to Biomarker Identification – Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News

Some patients are not eligible for targeted treatments for colorectal cancer because they have cancer-promoting mutations that are believed to cause resistance to these drugs. Now, researchers combined mathematical modeling with experimental cancer cell biology to determine why KRAS G13D is a biomarker for sensitivity to epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)-targeted therapies. This finding suggests that personalized medicine may benefit from using biomarkers based on biophysically defined subsets of mutations instead of gene-based and allele-based biomarker strategies.

The findings were published inCell Reports in the paper, Identification of RAS mutant biomarkers for EGFR inhibitor sensitivity using a systems biochemical approach.

Colorectal cancer patients who have tried all of the standard treatment options but still seen their cancer progress are in need of new options. Our study suggests that one already available targeted therapy could benefit up to 12,000 additional colon cancer patients every year, said Edward Stites, MD, PhD, assistant professor, integrative biology laboratory at the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences. Our findings are preclinical, and we hope this research will motivate clinicians to develop clinical trials that further examine our results.

Cetuximab was the first drug to gain FDA approval to block EGFR activity in colorectal cancer. Since then, other drugs that target EGFR also have received approval. But from the early development of these drugs, doctors believed that patients with a mutation in any one of the RAS proteins would not respond to EGFR drugs. Therefore, whenever molecular testing of a patients tumor revealed a RAS mutation, the patient was not offered these targeted therapies.

However, not all RAS mutations are the same. The critical mechanistic difference, the authors noted, between KRAS G13D and the other most common KRAS mutants is impaired binding to tumor suppressor Neurofibromin (NF1). The team hypothesized that impaired binding to NF1 is a biophysical biomarker that defines other RAS mutations that retain therapeutic sensitivity to EGFR inhibition.

The researchers combined computational and experimental approaches to find more RAS mutations that should not cause resistance to the EGFR drugs. Using cells from cancers that were identical except for specific RAS mutations allowed them to compare how each specific mutation influenced the response to EGFR-inhibiting drugs. They found that some RAS mutations did not prevent the drugs from working. These experiments also allowed them to validate their computational studies, which helps establish how new computational methods could contribute to improving treatment options for cancer patients.

The investigators also examined how well different RAS mutants bound to NF1. Stites previous mathematical models hinted that NF1 could play a key role in the cells response to targeted drugs. In their new studies, the researchers revealed that the RAS mutants that do not bind NF1 well retain sensitivity to EGFR drugs, while the RAS mutants that bind NF1 well are resistant to EGFR drugs. This relationship to EGFR drugs was not originally apparent, but the computational modeling was able to uncover it from within the available and varied data.

Ultimately, the investigators identified 10 distinct RAS mutations that do not preclude the use of EGFR inhibitors. Many of the drugs that would work for these mutations are already approved by the FDA for other uses, which means that doctors could start prescribing them for their patients off label even before clinical trials are conducted.

Stites stresses that this study also helps to validate the mathematical and computational methods developed by his team. Models can solve scientific problems that traditional methods cannot, he said. We hope that future clinical trials will help identify the magnitude of benefit as well as whether all the RAS mutations we identified are equally sensitive to the EGFR-inhibiting drugs and how other mutations in addition to RAS may influence the strength of the response.

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Colorectal Cancer Patients May Have More Drug Options With Systems Approach to Biomarker Identification - Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News