Cheaper medicines for people living with cystic fibrosis - Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing

The publication of this infographic was funded by Vertex Pharmaceuticals. Medical writing assistance was provided by Bethany Cooper, Ownership Health Limited, UK. Advances in cystic fibrosis care have transformed expectations for many people living with the disease. Evidence continues to support intervening early to prevent irreversible organ damage and optimise outcomes.

Retroperitoneal fibrosis (RPF) is a rare fibroinflammatory disorder in which fibrous tissue forms around the infrarenal aorta and iliac vessels, often compressing the ureters and causing obstructive uropathy and renal impairment. It typically presents insidiously with back, flank, or abdominal pain and constitutional symptoms. We describe a 52-year-old man with a background of hypertension who presented on three occasions over 10 months with an acutely painful, swollen first metatarsophalangeal (MTP) joint, initially on the left and subsequently on the right. The first two episodes were managed as presumed gout, with naproxen and then a short course of oral prednisolone, and his symptoms settled between attendances. His serum urate and creatinine rose across these attendances. At his third presentation, he was incidentally found to be hypertensive with severe renal impairment and was admitted. Imaging demonstrated bilateral hydronephrosis secondary to ureteric compression by a confluent para-aortic soft tissue mass. Following further investigation and specialist multidisciplinary team review, a working diagnosis of idiopathic RPF was made. Bilateral nephrostomies relieved the obstr

Fibrosis, the dense scar tissue that can entangle peritoneal tumors and the healthy organs around them, is one reason cytoreduction surgery is denied to a portion of patients with appendiceal and other abdominal cancers. Allegheny Health Network Cancer Center’s newly launched RANDY’S Trial is built on a direct answer to that problem: test whether FDA-approved drugs already on the market can remodel that scar tissue and bring more patients into surgical eligibility. The trial did not emerge from a pharma pipeline or an NIH grant. A single community gala, the La Sera d’Oro event, raised $44,000 in 2025 to fund it. The acronym stands for Repurposed And Naturally-Derived Drugs for the Treatment of Fibrosis in Peritoneal Carcinomatosis. Principal investigator Patrick Wagner, a surgical oncologist at AHN, is leading a multidisciplinary team that will evaluate existing medications for their ability to break down or remodel abdominal scar tissue. The mechanism matters because fibrosis does two things that complicate surgery: it obscures the boundary between healthy and diseased tissue, and it can trap cancer cells that are then left behind when a surgeon separates planes.

Pulmonary fibrosis (PF) is a complex lung disease and falls under a larger group of lung diseases called interstitial lung disease (ILD). Genetics, certain medications and environmental exposures are some of the known causes of PF. Most often the cause is not known, which is referred to as idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). In July 2025, the Lung Association, with support from the Feldman Family Foundation, launched the Pulmonary Fibrosis Lung Health Navigator program. The program provides participants with trusted lung disease education, personalized guidance and empowers participants to advocate for their lung health. To understand the impact of the free Lung Health Navigator program, we sat down with program participants to hear about their experience. We also spoke with Lung Health Navigators, Denise and Tiffany, who shared how the program helps those who call. Access Trusted InformationPeople living with PF have questions about their diagnosis, treatment options and what to expect as the disease progresses. Often, finding reliable information can be a challenge.

Case: In a patient diagnosed with metastatic clear cell RCC, foci observed at very low levels on 18F-FDG PET/CT, and some that were not detectable at all, were seen as dramatically dense on [68Ga]Ga-DPI-4452-PET/CT (carbonic anhydrase IX receptor) imaging. Image courtesy of Prof. Arslan Research was presented at the 39th Annual Congress of the European Association of Nuclear Medicine (EANM’26)

AcknowledgementsThe authors thank Arcus Biosciences for providing AB680 and AB928 for the experiments. This research was supported [in part] by the Intramural Research Program of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Cancer Institute, CCR, CIL. The contributions of the NIH authors (S. T., C. I. K. C., F. J. G.) were made as part of their official duties as NIH federal employees, are in compliance with agency policy requirements, and are considered Works of the United States Government. However, the findings and conclusions presented in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the NIH or the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services. Schematic diagrams (Figs. 1A, E, 2A, E, 5D, 6A, D and 7A, G) were created with BioRender.com. FundingThis work was funded by NIH grants R01CA148828, R01CA245546, R01DK095201, and UMCCC Core Grant P30CA046592 (Y. M. S.). R01AI152517 to C. A. P. R01CA248160 to C. A. L. R. S. was supported by a Postdoctoral Fellowship (032650) from the American Physiological Society and a Research Fellow Award (1003279) from the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation. N. W. Z.