A Diagnostics & Imaging Week

U.S. Representatives Elijah Cummings (D-Maryland) and Albert Wynn (D-Maryland) reported that they will co-sponsor legislation that would fund the development of advances for improving the diagnosis of prostate cancer.

“Current diagnostic tools for prostate cancer are grossly inadequate,” said Angelo De Marzo, MD, PhD, associate professor of pathology, oncology and urology at Johns Hopkins University (Baltimore), who joined Cummings and Wynn at a press conference on Capitol Hill, hosted by the AdMeTech Foundation, an organization pursuing advanced technologies for diagnosing this disease. “They often produce inconclusive or misleading results, leading to widespread unnecessary treatment that can cause complications and ratchet up our nation’s ever-growing health care costs,” De Marzo said.

The bill would authorize $650 million to the National Institutes of Health and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for prostate cancer imaging research and education. A Senate version of the bill, known as the Prostate Research Imaging and Men’s Education Act (PRIME Act. S. 1734), was introduced by Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-California) in June.

NIH implements new stem cell order

The National Institutes of Health reported this week that it will begin implementing President Bush’s executive order to explore methods to expand the number of approved pluripotent stem cell lines “without creating a human embryo for research purposes or destroying, discarding, or subjecting to harm a human embryo or fetus.”

The order calls on Michael Leavitt, secretary of Health and Human Services, to support research that takes advantage of emerging potential alternative methods for generating stem cells that are pluripotent — that is, capable of producing all or almost all of the cell types in the developing body.

“The NIH has developed a sound, ambitious strategy to advance pluripotent stem cell research and generate more opportunities in this critical area,” Secretary Leavitt said. “I sincerely hope that these steps will accelerate the discovery of new cures and treatments.”

“NIH has been pursuing the potential of stem cells on all fronts, whether they are human embryonic, adult, or cord blood — since they were discovered. It is one of the central scientific challenges of our time,” said Elias Zerhouni, MD, director of NIH Director. “NIH will continue to consult widely with the scientific community to determine the best approaches.”

“The Executive Order recognizes the recent developments in adult mouse cells that can be reprogrammed to behave like embryonic stem cells, and we’ve laid out a strategy to explore their possible applications to human cells,” said Story Landis, PhD, Director of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke. She also serves as the chair of the NIH Stem Cell Task Force.

The NIH plan includes a number of new or accelerated activities.

For example, the NIH Stem Cell Task Force will develop several funding opportunity announcements, including a Program Announcement (PA). The PA will ask for grant applications proposing research on human pluripotent stem cells derived from non-embryonic sources, such as somatic cells or cells found in amniotic fluid. In addition, the Stem Cell Task Force will create two supplement programs that will stimulate research in specific areas rapidly. They would be awarded to researchers already working in stem cell research to augment certain areas of their work that are of particular interest to NIH.