BOSTON — As rates of colorectal cancer continue to rise among young adults, a team of Boston researchers has identified differences in tumor cells that could potentially lead to new treatments.
The findings offer hope to survivors like Kristen Vincent of Orléans, who was just 37 when she learned she had stage 3 colorectal cancer.
“I was actually staged on my youngest daughter’s second birthday. So I found out I had stage three cancer on her second birthday, and that was my biggest fear of missing out on their life,” Vincent said.
His treatment at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute included 28 days of radiation, surgery, eight cycles of chemotherapy and 11 months with an ileostomy bag.
Throughout her fight, Vincent said she tried to maintain a positive attitude.
“Every day I told myself that cancer is not going to kill me today,” Vincent said.
Today, Vincent had five years of clean scans. She has also participated in the Pan-Mass Challenge for several years, raising more than $25,000 for cancer research at Dana-Farber, the hospital she credits for her positive results.
According to the American Cancer Society, rates of colorectal cancer in people under 50 have increased nearly 3 percent annually in recent years. This disease is now the leading cause of cancer death in this age group.
Researchers from Mass General Brigham, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the Broad Institute have published a study examining why more and more younger patients are being diagnosed with the disease.
“We’ve seen, as you said, an upward trend in the incidence of colorectal cancer in people under 50 for some time. But we really didn’t know why. We didn’t know if the disease was different in younger people versus older people. And that’s what our study aimed to address,” said Dr. Ana Anderson, one of the study’s co-senior authors.
The research team analyzed 189 tumors and more than 850,000 individual cell nuclei, including samples from more than 50 patients under the age of 50.
Anderson said researchers found differences in cell and gene expression in tumors from younger patients compared to older patients.
“Specifically, we found that stromal cells, the cells that make up connective tissue, are in higher proportion than malignant cancer cells in tumors from younger patients,” Anderson said.
According to Anderson, these stromal cells can produce factors that suppress the immune system, making it harder for the body to fight cancer. They can also form a barrier preventing drugs from entering tumors.
Researchers have also identified differences in genes that may contribute to more aggressive forms of the disease.
The findings don’t yet explain why more young people are developing colorectal cancer, but Anderson said they offer new leads for researchers and could eventually lead to treatments specifically designed for younger patients.
“Before we were just trying to look for differences, now we have some differences that we can dig into to hopefully understand the biology, and that could lead to further interventions,” Anderson said.
For Vincent, the new research and the potential to do more are encouraging.
“It’s exciting for me because the last thing I want is another young person with a young family to have to go through what I went through,” Vincent said.
She also encourages others, especially young adults, not to ignore potential warning signs.
“If you find blood in your stool, you should call your doctor immediately if it is consistent, because the sooner you can get the diagnosis, the more likely you are to beat this problem,” Vincent said. “So please don’t be embarrassed. Colonoscopies aren’t that bad. It’s so critical to catch them early.”
The key takeaways from this article were generated with the help of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article itself is solely written by humans.
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