Active clinical trials for "Neoplasm Metastasis"

RATIONALE: Drugs used in chemotherapy, such as docetaxel, work in different ways to stop tumor cells from dividing so they stop growing or die. Imatinib mesylate may stop the growth of tumor cells by blocking the enzymes necessary for their growth. Combining docetaxel with imatinib mesylate may be effective treatment for androgen-independent prostate cancer and bone metastases. PURPOSE: This randomized phase II trial is studying docetaxel and imatinib mesylate to see how well they work compared to docetaxel alone in treating patients with androgen-independent prostate cancer and bone metastases.

Relapsed disease is the most common cause of death in children with hematological malignancies. Patients who fail high-intensity conventional chemotherapeutic regimens or relapse after stem cell transplantation have a poor prognosis. Toxicity from multiple therapies and elevated leukemic/tumor burden usually make these patients ineligible for the aggressive chemotherapy regimens required for conventional stem cell transplantation. Alternative options are needed. One type of treatment being explored is called haploidentical transplant. Conventional blood or bone marrow stem cell transplant involves destroying the patient's diseased marrow with radiation or chemotherapy. Healthy marrow from a donor is then infused into the patient where it migrates to the bone marrow space to begin generating new blood cells. The best type of donor is a sibling or unrelated donor with an identical immune system (HLA "match"). However, most patients do not have a matched sibling available and/or are unable to identify an acceptable unrelated donor through the registries in a timely manner. In addition, the aggressive treatment required to prepare the body for these types of transplants can be too toxic for these highly pretreated patients. Therefore doctors are investigating haploidentical transplant using stem cells from HLA partially matched family member donors. Although haploidentical transplant has proven curative in many patients, this procedure has been hindered by significant complications, primarily regimen-related toxicity including graft versus host disease (GVHD), and infection due to delayed immune reconstitution. These can, in part, be due to certain white blood cells in the graft called T cells. GVHD happens when the donor T cells recognize the patient's (the host) body tissues are different and attack these cells. Although too many T cells increase the possibility of GVHD, too few may cause the recipient's immune system to reconstitute slowly or the graft to fail to grow, leaving the patient at high-risk for infection. However, the presence of T cells in the graft may offer a positive effect called graft versus malignancy or GVM. With GVM, the donor T cells recognize the patient's malignant cells as diseased and, in turn, attack these diseased cells. For these reasons, a primary focus for researchers is to engineer the graft to provide a T cell depleted product to reduce the risk of GVHD, yet provide a sufficient number of cells to facilitate immune reconstitution, graft integrity and GVM. In this study, patients were given a haploidentical graft engineered to with specific T cell parameter values using the CliniMACS system. A reduced intensity, preparative regimen was used to reduce regimen-related toxicity and mortality. The primary goal of this study is to evaluate overall survival in those who receive this study treatment.

The purpose of this study is to demonstrate improvement in overall survival for the combination of whole brain radiation therapy (WBRT) plus temozolomide (TMZ) versus WBRT alone. Secondary objective is to demonstrate an improvement in the time to radiological CNS progression with the addition of TMZ to WBRT.

This international study will study how metastatic breast cancer responds to the investigational drug treatment, what are the side effects of the investigational drug when given to women with metastatic breast cancer and how often do these side effects occur. The study will also analyze how fast investigational drug and its breakdown products are cleared from the blood in these patients.

RSR13 (efaproxiral) is a radiation sensitizer that has shown positive results in a Phase 3, randomized clinical trial of patients with brain metastases. Of 111 eligible breast cancer patients with brain metastases in that trial, 59 patients who received RSR13 prior to radiation therapy had a median survival time that was twice as long as the 52 patients who did not receive RSR13 prior to radiation therapy. RSR13 (efaproxiral) is an experimental drug that increases the amount of oxygen released from blood into the tissues. It is well known that certain types of cancer tumors, including those in brain metastases, lack oxygen. Lack of oxygen in a tumor can reduce the effect of radiation therapy (RT). RSR13 may increase the oxygen level in brain tumors so that radiation therapy works better. This study will enroll up to 360 women with brain metastases from breast cancer, and will evaluate if whole brain radiation therapy given with RSR13 will have a better treatment effect than whole brain radiation therapy alone. RSR13 will be infused intravenously (IV) through a central catheter placed in a central vein. Women randomized (assigned) to receive RSR13, therefore, will need to have a central catheter placed for treatment unless one is already in place.

RATIONALE: Drugs used in chemotherapy such as docetaxel work in different ways to stop tumor cells from dividing so they stop growing or die. Imatinib mesylate may stop the growth of tumor cells by blocking the enzymes necessary for their growth. Giving docetaxel with imatinib mesylate may kill more tumor cells. PURPOSE: This phase II trial is studying how well giving docetaxel with imatinib mesylate works in treating patients with androgen-independent prostate cancer and bone metastases that progressed while receiving docetaxel and a placebo on clinical trial MDA-ID-030008.

Interleukin-12 may kill tumor cells by stopping blood flow to the tumor and by stimulating a person's white blood cells to kill cancer cells. Monoclonal antibodies such as trastuzumab can locate tumor cells and either kill them or deliver tumor-killing substances to them without harming normal cells. Phase I trial to study the effectiveness of interleukin-12 and trastuzumab in treating patients who have cancer that has high levels of HER2/neu and has not responded to previous therapy

RATIONALE: Biological therapies use different ways to stimulate the immune system and stop cancer cells from growing. PURPOSE: Phase I trial to study the effectiveness of biological therapy in treating patients who have metastatic cancer that has not responded to previous treatment.

RATIONALE: Stereotactic radiosurgery delivers x-rays directly to the tumor and may cause less damage to normal tissue. PURPOSE: Phase II trial to study the effectiveness of stereotactic radiosurgery in treating patients who have liver metastases, lung metastases, or other advanced solid tumors.

Matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) are a class of membrane bound enzymes that are involved in the degradation of the extracellular matrix. MMP-2 and MMP-9 have been associated with the progression of cancer. It is hypothesized than an imbalance between MMPs and MMP inhibitors allows the destruction of the extracellular matrix and enhances the ability of the tumor cells to grow and metastasize. By inhibiting MMPs, it is thought that angiogenesis and metastasis can be inhibited. This is a phase I study of COL-3, an oral matrix metalloproteinase inhibitor, in patients with refractory metastatic cancer. COL-3 is a chemically modified tetracycline derivative. Patients must have clinically progressive disease documented within 1 month prior to entry to be eligible for treatment. Patients must have also failed therapy of proven efficacy for their disease and have an ECOG performance status of less or equal than 2. Patients must be willing to travel from their home to the NIH for follow-up visits. Patients with brain metastases or primary CNS malignancies are not eligible. Concurrent therapy for their cancer (i.e., radiation therapy, chemotherapy, etc.) will preclude participation. We will be defining the maximum tolerated dose, the toxicity profile, characterizing the pharmacokinetics, and evaluating the effect of COL-3 on several biological endpoints.