The Price of Deception: How a Duke Patient was Harmed in Potti’s Fraudulent Trials
Joyce Shoffner would never have predicted that Duke University, an institution she revered and at one time worked for, would put her in a breast cancer clinical trial testing a fraudulent technology.
“They advertised publicly that this science offered an 80 percent cure rate,” Shoffner said. “To have the type of cancer I had, I was just going to do that, there’s nobody that’s going to stop me, because this was what I was told and this was what I believed was going to happen.”
In July 2008, Shoffner became patient No. 1 in the trial that promised to choose the best therapy for the unique characteristics of her disease. Alas, the groundbreaking genomic predictors pioneered by Anil Potti and his mentor Joseph Nevins, which the trials were testing, would turn out to be fraudulent.
Read the full story on The Cancer Letter.
“They advertised publicly that this science offered an 80 percent cure rate,” Shoffner said. “To have the type of cancer I had, I was just going to do that, there’s nobody that’s going to stop me, because this was what I was told and this was what I believed was going to happen.”
In July 2008, Shoffner became patient No. 1 in the trial that promised to choose the best therapy for the unique characteristics of her disease. Alas, the groundbreaking genomic predictors pioneered by Anil Potti and his mentor Joseph Nevins, which the trials were testing, would turn out to be fraudulent.
Read the full story on The Cancer Letter.
Harvard Physician, Whose Cancer Was Spread Through Morcellation, Seeks to Revamp FDA Regulation of Medical Devices
On Oct. 17, 2013, a surgical instrument called a power morcellator tore into the uterus of Amy Reed, an anesthesiologist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, pulverizing what were believed to be benign fibroids. Reed’s “minimally invasive” hysterectomy, a routine procedure, was performed at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital, a teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School.
Alas, Reed’s uterus contained an occult sarcoma, which the morcellator proceeded to spread through her abdominal pelvic cavity. Over ensuing months, as Reed battled to stay alive, her husband, Hooman Noorchashm, a cardiothoracic surgeon and, at the time, a lecturer at Harvard, waged a national campaign to put an end to the practice of power morcellation.
Read the full story on The Cancer Letter.
Alas, Reed’s uterus contained an occult sarcoma, which the morcellator proceeded to spread through her abdominal pelvic cavity. Over ensuing months, as Reed battled to stay alive, her husband, Hooman Noorchashm, a cardiothoracic surgeon and, at the time, a lecturer at Harvard, waged a national campaign to put an end to the practice of power morcellation.
Read the full story on The Cancer Letter.
Book Trailer: The Stager, A Novel by Susan Coll (Macmillan Publishers)
A book trailer for The Stager, a comedy of rabbits and real estate in the D.C. suburbs from Susan Coll, the author of Acceptance and Beach Week. Questions of friendship, loyalty, fidelity, sobriety, and sanity are raised to effect in The Stager, a dark comedy of how we live now in the age of planned communities, cookie-cutter mansions, and cutthroat careerism.
Special report: Family day care providers squeezed by low ratings, new rules
Faced with a new rating system designed to encourage formal education for day care workers and prevent fraud, licensed Milwaukee family providers with a 2-star rating are struggling with a new attendance-based reimbursement system and an upcoming reduction in state subsidies due to their low ratings. They say they can't afford to attain the higher education levels necessary to move up the YoungStar rating scale.
NOVA students visit the Jewish Museum MilwaukeeNova High School students recently visited the Jewish Museum Milwaukee to learn how to be docents. They are creating an exhibit on the Milwaukee civil rights movement with Arts@Large, a program providing arts experiences for Milwaukee Public Schools students.
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MCTS commuters speak up on route changesMilwaukee County Transit System's Route 18 was among the few public bus routes eliminated January 29 as a result of budget cuts to Wisconsin transit systems. Now replaced by other lines, Route 18 ran on National Avenue between South 2nd Street and South 124th Street.
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'Occupy' protestors march in MilwaukeeHundreds gathered in Lincoln Park Saturday afternoon for an Occupy the Hood rally and marched to the shuttered Tower Automotive plant on Milwaukee's north side. Organizers aim to bring more ethnic minorities and their voices to the Occupy Wall Street movement.
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Occupy Milwaukee marchers sound offProtesters representing a patchwork quilt of causes, from the recall of Gov. Scott Walker to economic justice and an end to housing foreclosures, took to the streets of downtown Milwaukee on Saturday as the Occupy Wall Street movement spread to Wisconsin and elsewhere.
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Visitors find labyrinth amazingA two-acre community garden located in Johnsons Park, Alice's Garden is managed by SeedFolks Youth Ministry and the Center for Resilient Cities and is named after Alice M. Taylor, the late executive director of Milwaukee County Cooperative Extension.
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North Division High School reopensAfter undergoing a reform process that began in 2009, North Division High School has big plans to provide students with a high-quality education, reversing many years of poor academic achievement.
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