Patients are at risk of being misled over the benefits of homeopathy by the government's decision to fund the remedies on the NHS, the country's most senior scientist warned today.

Sir John Beddington, the government's chief scientific adviser, said patients might believe homeopathic treatments could protect them against serious illnesses, or treat existing conditions, because GPs and hospitals are allowed to prescribe them on the NHS.

Ian Sample, NHS funding for homeopathy risks misleading patients, says chief scientist, October 27, 2010.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/oct/27/nhs-funding-homeopathy-chief-scientist

2) British Journal of Cancer

Clinical development of new anticancer drugs can be compromised by a lack of qualified biomarkers. An indispensable component to successful biomarker qualification is assay validation, which is also a regulatory requirement. In order to foster flexible yet rigorous biomarker method validation, the fit-for-purpose approach has recently been developed. This minireview focuses on many of the basic issues surrounding validation of biomarker assays utilised in clinical trials. It also provides an overview on strategies to validate each of the five categories that define the majority of biomarker assays.

J Cummings, F Raynaud, L Jones, et al. Fit-for-purpose biomarker method validation for application in clinical trials of anticancer drugs. British Journal of Cancer (2010) 103, 1313–1317. doi:10.1038/sj.bjc.

3) The Lancet

Aspirin taken for several years at doses of at least 75 mg daily reduced long-term incidence and mortality due to colorectal cancer. Benefit was greatest for cancers of the proximal colon, which are not otherwise prevented effectively by screening with sigmoidoscopy or colonoscopy.

Rothwell PM, Wilson M, Elwin CE, et al. Long-term effect of aspirin on colorectal cancer incidence and mortality: 20-year follow-up of five randomised trials. Lancet. 2010 Oct 21

4) Lancet Oncology

Imatinib can be safely discontinued in patients with a CMR of at least 2 years duration. Imatinib

discontinuation in this setting yields promising results for molecular relapse-free survival, raising the possibility that,at least in some patients, CML might be cured with tyrosine kinase inhibitors.

François-Xavier Mahon, Delphine Réa, Joëlle Guilhot, et al. Discontinuation of imatinib in patients with chronic myeloid leukaemia who have maintained complete molecular remission for at least 2 years: the prospective, multicentre Stop Imatinib (STIM) trial. The Lancet Oncology, Early Online Publication, 20 October 2010.