No Such Thing as ‘Cancer Personality’

6/6/2003 Sendai, Japan Daniel DeNoon Personality Types Unrelated to Risk of Developing Cancer When it comes to cancer, it doesn't matter how outgoing, emotional, aggressive, or conformist you are. Your personality doesn't affect your risk of cancer, a new study suggests. Some -- but by no means all -- earlier studies have found links between cancer and certain personality types. These included being extroverted, having a "type 1" personality, and lacking emotion. These studies had various weaknesses. They tended to focus on small numbers of people. And they often failed to control for important cancer risk factors, such as smoking. Now, a research team led by Yoshitaka Tsubono, MD, of Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan, has solved those problems. The researchers gave personality tests to 30,277 people living in northern Japan. Seven years later, they looked at who got cancer and who didn't. Four Personality Traits Tsubono's team used a test called the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire. It uses four measures to analyze personality: *Extroversion-Introversion. Extroverts are very social people. They have lots of friends and must talk with other people a lot. They like excitement, take risks, and act on the spur of the moment. Introverts are quite and studious. They plan ahead, don't easily lose their tempers, and value ethical standards. *Neuroticism. People with high "N" scores tend to be very emotional and overactive. They have trouble calming down. They complain about vague physical problems and tend to be worried, anxious, and irritated. *Psychoticism (Tough-Mindedness). People with high "P" [...]

2009-03-22T20:16:32-07:00June, 2003|Archive|

Paclitaxel-Based Regimen Effective for Head and Neck Cancer

6/5/2003 Chicago Charlene Laino In a finding that some physicians say could transform the management of people with locally advanced head and neck cancer, researchers have found that adding paclitaxel to the standard chemotherapy regimen completely wipes out tumors in about one third of patients, extending lives. Patients given the paclitaxel combination are also more likely to retain the ability to speak and swallow, resulting in improved quality of life, said Ricardo Hitt, MD, PhD, an oncologist at the Hospital 12 de Octubre in Madrid, Spain, and the chief investigator of the new study. Based on results of a phase II trial pitting paclitaxel plus the standard regimen of cisplatin and 5-fluorouracil (5-FU) against the standard regimen alone, the researchers hypothesized that the triplet would shrink more tumors, extending survival. Which is just what happened, Dr. Hitt reported here at the 39th annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology. In the prospective, randomized phase III study of 384 patients with locally advanced head and neck cancers, mostly tumors of the oropharynx, larynx, and oral cavity, patients were randomly assigned to receive either 100 mg/m2 of cisplatin on day 1 plus a continual infusion of 1 g/m2 of 5-FU for five days every three weeks, or the same drugs plus 175 mg/m2 of paclitaxel on day 1 of each cycle. About 35% of the patients, whose median age was 56 years, had resectable disease. Three quarters had a performance status of 1, and 84.1% had stage IV disease. Tumors [...]

2009-03-22T20:15:03-07:00June, 2003|Archive|
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