Hodgkin's Lymphoma - Getting the Bigger Picture on FDG scans and radiobiology

07/14/21 • 43 min

In the first part of this episode of The Bigger Picture, Maggie talks to Vincent Kearney about his experience of being diagnosed and treated for Hodgkin's lymphoma. Vincent explains how he was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma and the treatment that he underwent. He also gives a nice explanation of what it's like having an FDG scan in the PET centre.
In the second part of the podcast, Maggie spoke to Dr Sam Terry, who works in the area of radiobiology. We find out what radiobiology is and what we might learn from Dr Terry's work to improve treatment of cancer using a different class of radioactive drugs that kill cancer cells from the inside and leaves normal tissue unharmed.
There's certainly a lot to think about from both interviews and hopefully messages that we can take from them to improve the quality and impact of our research.
Thanks to the Centre for Medical Engineering at King's College London for the Public Engagement funding for this podcast.

Previous Episode

Ovarian Cancer - Getting the Bigger Picture on antibody treatment for ovarian cancer

Ovarian cancer can creep up on you unexpectedly. Maxine had symptoms similar to a pre-existing condition and didn’t know that she had cancer. We talked about how she got her diagnosis, the symptoms she experienced and what had happened since that initial diagnosis.

We also talk to Prof James Spicer who heads up an experimental cancer medicines unit at Guy’s and St Thomas’ Hospital in London. We discuss different types of treatment including a novel approach to using antibodies to treat ovarian cancer.

Finally, we talk to Dr Francis Man about how radiolabelling the antibody that Prof Spicer is using, may allow us to better understand how the antibody is working and whether it is going to the parts of the body that we expect.

The symptoms of ovarian cancer can be difficult to detect as Maxine found. Ovacome have a nice easy way to remember what to look out for called BEAT. B is for bloating, E is for a change in eating habits, A is for abdominal pain and T is for a change in toilet habits. (https://www.ovacome.org.uk)

This podcast is supported by a grant from the Public Engagement Fund in the Centre for Medical Engineering at King’s College London.

Next Episode

Lobular Breast Cancer - Getting the Bigger Picture on lobular breast cancer

Around 55,000 women and 370 men are diagnosed with breast cancer every year in the UK, about 15% of these are diagnosed with lobular breast cancer, but what is lobular breast cancer?
In this month's episode, Maggie spoke to Darlaine Honey about her experience of being diagnosed with lobular breast cancer, the difficulties that she faced and her drive to find better management for patients with this type of cancer. We discussed whether it might be possible to use some existing radiotracers to look at whether the disease has spread to other areas of the body and how the disease is currently managed.
Breast cancer can spread to the bones and, although there are radiotracers currently being used to find these metastases, at the School of Biomedical Engineering and Imaging Sciences at King's College London, we are looking at improving these tracers to get a more accurate picture of whether their are metastases and where they are. Dr George Keeling is working on a 'kit' which can be used to prepare one such radio tracer very easily and without the need for expensive equipment. I spoke to George about his research and about how his 'kit' is a little bit like instant noodles.
To find out more about Darlaine's story see here or here
This podcast was generously supported by the Public Engagement funding from the Centre for Medical Engineering at King's College London.