stress – Oral Cancer News

Minimizing Imaging for Recurrence of HPV-Associated Head & Neck Cancer

Source: www.journals.lww.com/oncologytimesAuthor: Robert H. Carlson SCOTTSDALE, ARIZ.—Most recurrences of HPV-positive oropharyngeal squamous cell carcinoma (OPSCC) can be found through imaging and physical exams within six months after treatment, according to a study from the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute in Tampa, Fla. “For most patients with HPV-associated oropharyngeal cancer who have had a negative three-month PET scan, physical exams with history and direct visualization are sufficient to find recurrences,” said Jessica M. Frakes, MD, Assistant Member of the Department of Radiation Oncology at the institute and lead author on the study, in a presentation at the 2016 Multidisciplinary Head & Neck Cancer Symposium. “Minimizing the number of exams that do not compromise outcomes not only helps decrease anxiety and stress for our patients, but also eases the financial burden of cancer care,” she said. The study also supports the effectiveness of specialist teams in treating HPV-positive OPSCC with definitive radiation therapy. Frakes said local control at three years was 97.8; regional control 95.3 percent; locoregional control 94 percent; and freedom from distant metastases 91.4 percent. Three-year overall survival was 91 percent. “The number of OPSCC patients and survivors is growing, so there is a great need to determine the general time to recurrence and the most effective modes of recurrence detection in order to guide optimal follow-up care,” Frakes said. But National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) guidelines for treatment of OPSCC are “one size fits all,” she said, with the same follow-up recommendations whether the disease [...]

Charlotte Parker2016-04-18T17:27:00-07:00April, 2016|Oral Cancer News|

Depression and smoking linked to worse prognosis in oral cancer

Source: medicalresearch.com Author: staff MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Eileen H. Shinn PhD Assistant Professor, Department of Behavioral Science Cancer Prevention and Population Sciences, MD Anderson Cancer Center Medical Research: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Dr. Shinn: Recent studies with leukemia, breast, lung, renal and liver cancer patients have shown that patients with depression have worsened survival. These effect sizes are small, but independent of any of the traditional factors that are known to impact survival, such as extent of cancer, types of treatment administered and baseline health and age of the patient. The current thinking is that cancer patients who are depressed have chronically heightened responses to stress; the constant release of stress hormones trigger changes in the tumor itself (such as noradrenergically-driven tumor angiogenesis) or may weakens the body’s immune function and ability to resist tumor growth. When we measured depression in newly diagnosed patients with oropharyngeal cancer (cancer of the base of tongue and tonsil), we found that those patients who scored as depressed were 3.5 times more likely to have died within the five year period after their diagnosis, compared to non-depressed patients. We also found that patients who were depressed were also 3.8 times more likely to have their cancer recur within the first five years after diagnosis. We also found that patients who continued to smoke after diagnosis were more likely to recur within the first five years. These effect sizes were larger than those typically found in [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2015-12-13T08:51:57-07:00December, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

Taking out a cancer’s co-dependency: novel compound selectively kills cancer cells by blocking response to oxidative stress

Source: www.eurekalert.org Author: public release A cancer cell may seem out of control, growing wildly and breaking all the rules of orderly cell life and death. But amid the seeming chaos there is a balance between a cancer cell's revved-up metabolism and skyrocketing levels of cellular stress. Just as a cancer cell depends on a hyperactive metabolism to fuel its rapid growth, it also depends on anti-oxidative enzymes to quench potentially toxic reactive oxygen species (ROS) generated by such high metabolic demand. Scientists at the Broad Institute and Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) have discovered a novel compound that blocks this response to oxidative stress selectively in cancer cells but spares normal cells, with an effectiveness that surpassed a chemotherapy drug currently used to treat breast cancer. Their findings, based on experiments in cell culture and in mice, appear online in Nature on July 13. The plant-based compound piperlongumine (PL), derived from the fruit of a pepper plant found in southern India and southeast Asia, appears to kill cancer cells by jamming the machinery that dissipates high oxidative stress and the resulting ROS. Normal cells have low levels of ROS, in tune with their more modest metabolism, so they don't need high levels of the anti-oxidant enzymes that PL stymies once they pass a certain threshold. "Piperlongumine targets something that's not thought to be essential in normal cells," said Stuart L. Schreiber, a senior co-author and director of the Broad's Chemical Biology Program. "Cancer cells have a greater dependence on ROS [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2011-07-20T05:21:06-07:00July, 2011|Oral Cancer News|

Lower survival rate for head and neck cancer patients who suffer from stress and depression

Source: Medical News Today Studies have shown that stress can affect the immune system and weaken the body's defense against infection and disease. In cancer patients this stress can also affect a tumor's ability to grow and spread. However, the biological mechanisms that underlie such associations are not well understood. Now, researchers at Fox Chase Cancer Center find that poor psychosocial functioning is associated with greater vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) expression - a signaling protein that not only stimulates tumor growth, but is also associated with shorter disease-free survival in head and neck cancer patients. "There is research showing that high VEGF expression in other cancers, such as ovarian, is associated with psychosocial factors," says Carolyn Fang, Ph.D., Co-Leader of the Cancer Prevention and Control Program at Fox Chase, who presented the study at the 32nd Annual Meeting & Scientific Sessions of the Society of Behavioral Medicine on Thursday, April 28th. "This information coupled with what we already know about VEGF promoting tumor aggressiveness and poorer prognosis in head and neck cancer patients, certainly gave us a reason to look at this biomarker." VEGF not only plays a pivotal role in angiogenesis, but it is also regulated by stress hormones and key cytokines - a category of signaling molecules used extensively in intercellular communication. In the current study, Fang and colleagues looked at 37 newly diagnosed, pre-surgical head and neck cancer patients, to see if psychosocial functioning, such as perceived stress and depressive factors, was associated with VEGF, a [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2011-05-07T05:20:23-07:00May, 2011|Oral Cancer News|

VEGF expression tied to poor psychological function

Source: www.doctorslounge.com Author: press release Patients with newly diagnosed head and neck squamous cell carcinoma who have increased levels of perceived stress and depressive symptoms may have higher levels of vascular endothelial growth factor expression, which is associated with shorter disease-free survival, according to a study presented at the 32nd Annual Meeting & Scientific Sessions of the Society of Behavioral Medicine, held April 27 to 30 in Washington, D.C. Carolyn Y. Fang, Ph.D., from the Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, and colleagues analyzed the association between psychosocial functioning and biological pathways related to tumor growth (VEGF expression) in 37 newly diagnosed, predominantly male HNSCC patients with an average age of 56.7 years. The primary tumor sites were oral cavity, larynx, and oropharynx, and more than 40 percent of patients were categorized as having early-stage disease. Prior to treatment, patients completed psychosocial questionnaires, and VEGF expression was evaluated by immunohistochemical analysis of the tumor tissue obtained during surgery. The investigators found that, after controlling for disease stage, higher levels of perceived stress and depressive symptoms were significantly correlated with greater expression of VEGF in tumor tissue. After controlling for disease stage and other variables, increased VEGF expression was correlated with shorter disease-free survival (hazard ratio, 3.97). "Poorer psychosocial functioning was associated with greater expression of VEGF in tumor tissue. Greater VEGF expression was, in turn, associated with shorter disease-free survival in HNSCC patients," the authors write.

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2011-04-30T15:31:23-07:00April, 2011|Oral Cancer News|

The fog that follows chemotherapy

Source: nytimes.com Author: Jane E. Brody As more people with cancer survive and try to return to their former lives, a side effect of chemotherapy is getting more and more attention. Its name is apt, if unappealing: chemo brain. Nearly every chemotherapy patient experiences short-term problems with memory and concentration. But about 15 percent suffer prolonged effects of what is known medically as chemotherapy-induced cognitive impairment. The symptoms are remarkably consistent: a mental fogginess that may include problems with memory, word retrieval, concentration, processing numbers, following instructions, multitasking and setting priorities. In those affected — and doctors at this point have no way of predicting who might be — it is as if the cognitive portion of the brain were barely functioning. Symptoms are most apparent to high-functioning individuals used to juggling the demands of complex jobs or demanding home lives, or both. The chemo brain phenomenon was described two years ago in The New York Times by Jane Gross, who noted that after years of medical denial, “there is now widespread acknowledgment that patients with cognitive symptoms are not imagining things.” Some therapists have attributed the symptoms of chemo brain to anxiety, depression, stress, fatigue and fear rather than direct effects of chemotherapy on the brain and hormone balance. Yet when such factors dissipate, the symptoms may not. Recent studies that took other influences into account and analyzed how patients’ brains worked before and after cancer treatment have shown that cognitive effects of chemotherapy are real and, for some, [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2009-08-09T20:01:23-07:00August, 2009|Oral Cancer News|