Risk determination for pancreatic cancer

Pancreatic cancer represents one of the leading causes of cancer related deaths worldwide and constitutes a major public health problem. Despite the advances in diagnosis and treatment, the overall five-year survival remains low, thus leading the focus of medical research towards the identification and modification of potential risk factors. This year, in ASCO Annual Meeting two interesting studies were presented. Ghani et al. (abstract #e15183) sought to investigate the effect of smoking on chemotherapy response in patients with metastatic pancreatic cancer, while Walker et al. (abstract #4117) presented the results of their study regarding the effect of statin use in the prevention of pancreatic cancer. Both studies concluded to useful results that along with the existing literature may further stimulate medical research towards better recognition of risk factors and the application of this knowledge in the clinical practice.