Current opinion in oncology
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The purpose of this review is to assess recent evidence that demonstrates that aspirin has the potential to be an effective preventive and therapeutic agent in gastrointestinal malignancy. ⋯ These findings have re-awakened interest in the role of aspirin in the primary prevention of cancer and in the treatment of cancer. Randomized controlled trials are underway to assess the role of aspirin within the treatment algorithms of several solid common cancers.
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The purpose of this review is to provide an update on palliative sedation in palliative and end-of-life care. Palliative sedation is the medical procedure used to deal with refractory symptoms in advanced cancer patients when all other specific approaches have failed. ⋯ To maintain palliative sedation as a legitimate clinical procedure from any ethical or clinical point of view, it must be limited to the restricted area for which it was conceived, that is, relief from refractory suffering as deemed necessary by a patient and by an experienced palliative care team. In this way, there is no risk of associating palliative sedation with other end-of-life decisions. Close collaboration is needed between oncologists and palliative care physicians for this clinical procedure.