School of Nursing Receives Grant for Research in Breast Cancer Patients

By Amy Ridolphi
VCU School of Nursing

The Virginia Commonwealth University School of Nursing has received a five-year, $3.6 million grant from the National Institute of Nursing Research to study epigenetics and psychoneurologic symptoms in women with breast cancer.

The grant, awarded to Debra Lyon, Ph.D., R.N., chair of the Department of Family and Community Health Nursing, and Colleen Jackson-Cook, Ph.D., professor in the VCU School of Medicine, is the largest to date for the School of Nursing.

"This is the latest in the exciting research produced by faculty at the VCU School of Nursing,” said Nancy Langston, R.N., Ph.D., dean of the School of Nursing. “This promising new study will further support the effort to understand the basic mechanisms of symptoms associated with breast cancer and its treatment.

“As this research progresses, it could have a meaningful impact on the quality of life with women with breast cancer," Langston said.

Epigentics is the study of heritable changes in gene function that occur without a change in the sequence of the DNA, and the term psychoneurological refers to a cluster of symptoms that many women with breast cancer experience during treatment, and for some women, into survivorship.

Although advancements in treatments have improved survival rates, women with breast cancer experience a variety of symptoms during treatment that can continue into survivorship. The psychoneurological symptoms can include cognitive dysfunction, depression, anxiety, fatigue, sleep disturbances and pain.

Inflammatory activation and epigenetic alterations have been associated with cancer, but no researchers have studied the link between epigenetic processes and psychoneurological symptoms.  

The research team also will include School of Nursing researchers Nancy McCain, D.S.N, R.N.; Angela Starkweather, R.N., Ph.D.; and R.K. Elswick, Ph.D. Colleagues from the School of Medicine include Lynne Elmore, Ph.D., and Jacqueline Merrill, Ph.D.