Religious attitude, spirituality and mental adjustment in Turkish geriatric oncology patients.

AIM: This study was conducted to determine the relationship between religious attitudes and spirituality levels of geriatric oncology patients and their psychological reactions to cancer. METHODS: The sample consisted of 261 geriatric oncology patients who were inpatients in oncology and hematology clinics of a university hospital. The research was conducted between 30 July 2020 and 26 January 2022. Data were collected using the Mental Adjustment to Cancer (MAC) scale, the Ok-Religious Attitude (ORA) scale, and the Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy-Spiritual Well-being (FACIT-SP) scale. The effect of the ORA scale and FACIT-SP scale scores on the MAC scale were analyzed using path analysis. RESULTS: A positive relationship was found between Spiritual Well-Being and Fighting (ß = 0.028, p < 0.001) and Anxious Anticipation (ß = 0.024, p < 0.001); a negative relationship was found between Fatalism (ß = -0.023, p < 0.001), Helplessness/Hopelessness (ß = -0.04, p < 0.001) and Denial/Avoidance (ß = -0.026; p < 0.001). A positive relationship was found between Religious Attitude and Fighting Spirit (ß = 0.154, p = 0.009) and Anxious Anticipation (ß = 0.231, p < 0.001), while a negative relationship was found between Religious Attitude and Despair/Hopelessness (ß = -0.413, p < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: Patients' religious attitudes and spiritual well-being levels affected their psychological reactions to cancer, increased their "fighting spirit" and their "anxious preoccupation" about the disease, and decreased their helplessness/hopelessness, fatalism, denial and avoidance.

SLCO1B1 Polymorphisms are Associated With Drug Intolerance in Childhood Leukemia Maintenance Therapy.

BACKGROUND: Therapy discontinuations and toxicities occur because of significant interindividual variations in 6-mercaptopurine (6-MP) and methotrexate (MTX) response during maintenance therapy of childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL). 6-MP/MTX intolerance in some of the patients cannot be explained by thiopurine S-methyl transferase (TPMT) gene variants. In this study, we aimed to investigate candidate pharmacogenetic determinants of 6-MP and MTX intolerance in Turkish ALL children. METHODS: In total, 48 children with ALL who had completed or were receiving maintenance therapy according to Children's Oncology Group (COG) protocols were enrolled. Fifteen single-nucleotide polymorphisms in 8 candidate genes that were related to drug toxicity or had a role in the 6-MP/MTX metabolism (TPMT, ITPA, MTHFR, IMPDH2, PACSIN2, SLCO1B1, ABCC4, and PYGL) were genotyped by competitive allele-specific PCR (KASP). Drug doses during maintenance therapy were modified according to the protocol. RESULTS: The median drug dose intensity was 50% (28% to 92%) for 6-MP and 58% (27% to 99%) for MTX in the first year of maintenance therapy, which were lower than that scheduled in all patients. Among the analyzed polymorphisms, variant alleles in SLCO1B1 rs4149056 and rs11045879 were found to be associated with lower 6-MP/MTX tolerance. CONCLUSIONS: SLCO1B1 rs4149056 and rs11045879 polymorphisms may be important genetic markers to individualize 6-MP/MTX doses.

High Throughput FISH Analysis: A New, Sensitive Option For Evaluation of Hematological Malignancies.

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to determine the efficiency of the high throughput FISH analysis (HTFA) method for detecting genetic alterations in hematological malignancies, which is a new bacterial artificial chromosome array-based approach. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We performed a HTFA study of bone marrow aspiration and peripheral blood samples of 77 cases (n=19 myelodysplastic syndrome, n=17 acute lymphoblastic leukemia, n=9 chronic myeloid leukemia, n=32 acute myeloid leukemia) with hematological malignancies during the periods of initial diagnosis, treatment, and/or follow-up. RESULTS: Both numerical and structural abnormalities were detected by HTFA. We observed aberrations in 88% of our acute lymphoblastic leukemia patients, 25% of acute myeloid leukemia patients, and 31% of myelodysplastic syndrome patients. In chronic myeloid leukemia cases, aberration was not detected by HTFA. CONCLUSION: Our results showed that HTFA, combined with other methods, will gradually take a place in the routine diagnosis of hematologic malignancies. CONFLICT OF INTEREST: None declared.