Among cancers, nothing kills as surely and swiftly as pancreatic cancer. Of the almost 29,000 Americans diagnosed with the disease in 1998, most will be dead within a year. The five-year survival rate is 4%. But for the first time new drugs in development show real promise of extending lives while producing much less severe side effects than past treatments. First in line: new chemotherapies. Coming up: experimental vaccines and drugs that target the genetic machinery of pancreatic cancer cells. "Five years ago pancreatic cancer was a therapeutic wasteland," says Dr. Mace Rothenberg of Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville. "Now there are some exciting things going on for patients."
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