A postgraduate course and a scientific symposium will focus on the world’s deadliest and costliest chronic medical disease—tobacco dependence—covering topics from nicotine receptors to lung cancer and tuberculosis.
On Saturday, May 14, PG18 “Lung Cancer in 2011: The State of the Art,” which will take place from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the 2011 International Conference, will offer attendees a comprehensive review of the evaluation and management of patients with lung cancer, as well as novel insights into health policy and the biology of lung cancer, according to course co-chair David Feller-Kopman, MD.
David Feller-Kopman, MD
“Lung cancer kills more people in the United States than the next three cancers combined,” said Dr. Feller-Kopman, director of bronchoscopy and interventional pulmonology and associate professor of medicine at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, in explaining the importance of the course. “Over the last few years, there have been significant changes to the diagnosis, staging and treatment of lung cancer that directly impact the daily practice of chest physicians and allied health providers.”
The course will begin by taking attendees back to 1965, when Congress enacted the Federal Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act, which required tobacco companies to place warnings on cigarette packaging. Since that time, both the Surgeon General and the World Health Organization have recommended laws creating smoke-free places to protect non-smokers from exposure to tobacco smoke and to encourage existing smokers to quit.
“Laws creating smoke-free air work,” said Leslie Zellers, JD, legal director of the Technical Assistance Legal Center in Oakland, Calif., who will give a presentation on tobacco control policy during the course. She will cite results from the Pueblo Heart Study and the effect of municipal laws in Pueblo, Colo., and from California, home of the longest-running comprehensive anti-smoking program. “If each state sustained its recommended level of funding for comprehensive tobacco control programs for five years, an estimated 5 million fewer people in this country would smoke,” said Ms. Zellers, quoting statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “As a result, hundreds of thousands of premature tobacco-related deaths would be prevented.”
The course will then cover topics like lung cancer screening, genetics, staging and treatment. “Recent advances in the diagnosis and treatment of lung cancer include the use of screening chest CT scans in high-risk patients, endobronchial ultrasound for diagnosis and staging, targeted therapy based on molecular markers, as well as aggressive palliation leading to improved survival,” Dr. Feller-Kopman said. “Additionally, there are emerging data that the biology of lung cancer is different between men and women. This course will bring together worldwide experts in the field for a state-of-the-art review of lung cancer in 2011.”
Dr. Feller-Kopman will co-chair this course with Maria P. Rivera, MD, who is associate professor of medicine in the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, N.C.
Mary Ellen Wewers, PhD, MPH
A scientific symposium will address a range of topics regarding tobacco dependence and tuberculosis. “Smoking is a serious risk factor for tuberculosis,” said Mary Ellen Wewers, PhD, MPH, who will co-chair session B90 “Tuberculosis and Tobacco: New Advances from Bench to Bedside in Immunology, Epidemiology and Prevention” from 2 to 4:30 p.m. on Monday, May 16.
“The epidemiological evidence for an association between smoking and TB is growing,” said Dr. Wewers, who serves as professor of health behaviors and health promotion at The Ohio State University in Columbus. “Smoking behavior also influences disease progression and death from TB.”
The symposium, which crosses many disciplines, including epidemiology, immunology, clinical medicine, pharmacology and public health, will address the potential underlying mechanisms responsible for the relationship between smoking and TB.
A wide spectrum of topics will be covered to elucidate the smoking-tuberculosis relationship, including cigarette smoke and susceptibility to tuberculosis in animal models; smoking and the macrophage immune response to M. tuberculosis; active and passive smoke exposure and risk of TB; smoking and tuberculosis in India; smoking, TB and COPD; and the United States and global response to prevent smoking-related tuberculosis.
Tuberculosis is a serious problem that contributes substantially to the burden of disease, Dr. Wewers said. “Clinical management of TB must also address active smoking and exposure to secondhand smoke, as appropriate. Additional therapies to treat tobacco dependence must be incorporated into treatment, if indicated,” she said.
Dr. Wewers will co-chair the symposium with Mark Eisner, MD, MPH, associate professor of pulmonary and critical care at the University of California, San Francisco, and Mary Reichler, MD, of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.
PG18 and the International Conference are supported by an educational grant from Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals, Inc. The grant has no influence on the content, quality and scientific integrity of this CME activity, which is developed by the American Thoracic Society. All CME sessions are free of the control of commercial interests.