Learn-to-swim class

Learn-to-swim class

WARREN

The American Red Cross of the Mahoning Valley is offering its Summer 2014 learn-to-swim program at the Warren G. Harding High School pool for children 3-12. All preschool programs require an adult in the water with the child.

Registration is open to all. Children need not attend Warren schools. The lessons will consist of two-week sessions (Monday through Thursday). The registration fee is $30 per student per session. Paid registration is requested before the first day of class. Limited scholarships are available.

Registration forms are available at the Warren City Schools Administration Building, 105 High St. NE, Warren, and the Warren Harding High School main office, 860 Elm Road NE. A form may also be downloaded from the Warren City Schools’ website at http://www.warrenschools.k12.oh.us/. Call 330-392-2551 for information.

$1 million donated to Akron Children’s

AKRON

Akron Children’s Hospital received a $1 million gift from Tom and Joy Murdough of Hudson for the hospital’s Building on the Promise capital campaign. In recognition of their gift, the lobby in the new medical building on the Akron campus will be named “The Murdough Family Lobby.”

“Joy and I feel strongly about what the hospital has done for this community. Our children have received care at Akron Children’s, and because of that, it has been an important part of our lives for many years. We are honored to be able to give back to the hospital,” Tom Murdough said.

Akron Children’s broke ground on the new building in May 2013, and it’s expected to open next spring. The facility will house a neonatal intensive-care unit, emergency department, outpatient surgery center, and labor and delivery unit for high-risk newborns.

This is the largest capital campaign undertaken on behalf of Akron Children’s in its 124-year history. To date, the hospital has raised more than $26.2 million through support from individuals, companies, employees and private foundations

New approach studied

PHILADELPHIA

A gene signature identified using a new approach has the potential to be used in the clinic to predict which patients with estrogen receptor-positive breast cancer will benefit from tamoxifen therapy after surgery, according to data published in Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.

“We have used a very innovative approach to identify genes that help foretell whether a patient will respond to tamoxifen, and we showed that this gene signature performed well in two large patient groups,” said Rene Bernards, professor at and head of the Division of Molecular Carcinogenesis at the Netherlands Cancer Institute in Amsterdam.

“About one-third of women with hormone receptor-positive breast cancer experience a relapse after adjuvant treatment with tamoxifen. Median overall survival in these patients, even with further treatment, is around 30 to 45 months,” Bernards explained. “It has been very difficult to identify patients whose tumors lack a proper response to tamoxifen, the most frequently used drug in breast cancer.

Collectively, the researchers used data from about 680 patients from four different data sets to test the utility of the gene signature in predicting responses to tamoxifen therapy in hormone receptor-positive breast cancer patients.

“We are currently validating our promising results using the data from a prospective randomized controlled trial. If this is successful, clinical implementation is a logical next step,” Bernards said.