1/15/2005 Diana Parsell Science News USA Palm-Nut Problem Several hundred million people today practice the ancient custom of chewing betel. In south Asia, where the habit is most prevalent, the signs are hard to miss. Placed inside the cheek and sucked for hours, a betel wad turns saliva bright red, and betel users' spit does likewise to sidewalks and streets. People typically chew betel as a quid consisting of nut pieces from an Areca catechu palm mixed with powdered lime (calcium hydroxide) and wrapped in the leaf of the pepper plant Piper betle. Betel is used primarily as a stimulant. Areca nuts contain alkaloids that induce euphoria and raise a person's heart rate and skin temperature. Some chewers say a cheekful of betel aids digestion. Over the past decade, a variety of evidence has linked betel chewing to several types of oral cancer. Although the custom is falling out of fashion in several countries, such as Thailand and Cambodia, it's growing in popularity in other areas. Especially troubling is that many new betel users are adolescents and children, say Asian health officials. Some governments in Asia are taking steps to reduce betel use. Oral cancer is relatively rare in Western countries. In some south Asian countries, however, it ranks first among malignancies. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), a disproportionate number of the world's cases of oral cancer in men occurs in regions of Asia where betel chewing is common. Once diagnosed mainly in adults, such cancers are now [...]

1/12/2005 Cape Town, South Africa Ben MacLennan Mail & Guardian Online A good curry laden with spices can do wonders in keeping a range of diseases including cancer at bay, according to internationally acclaimed researcher Prof Bharat Aggarwal. "No question about it. I can commend it again and again," he said in Cape Town on Wednesday. "It is not only cancer, there are a number of other diseases ... right now there are clinical trials going on in the University of California with curcumin for dementia [and] Alzheimer's." Aggarwal was the main speaker on Wednesday at the opening of a three-day conference on the interface between natural products and molecular therapy, at the University of Cape Town's medical school. He is a researcher at the MD Anderson Cancer Centre at the University of Texas in the United States, where a major focus of his work has been curcumin, active component of the distinctive yellow curry spice turmeric. He said the dietary spices played an important role in fighting cancer. "That is becoming increasingly evident from a number of different sources. And that's why the incidence of cancer in countries like India where these spices are consumed is ten times lower [for] most cancers as compared to countries like the United States." Diseases like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's were rare in India -- "actually unheard of. And the question is, why? In my mind, curcumin certainly plays a role. "Even within India, in the south of India they use more curcumin that [...]

1/11/2005 Santa Monica, CA Press release Yahoo Business (biz.yahoo.com) Santa Monica Cancer Treatment Center Becomes One of the First Sites in the Country to Offer Optical Tracking Technology That Localizes Tumor Targets Santa Monica Cancer Treatment Center has today become one of the first centers in the country to install a new generation of optical tracking technology that offers the potential for improved cancer care by allowing for increased precision in the delivery of radiation treatment, thus allowing for higher dose with fewer complications. This technology will aid significantly in the treatment of patients with prostate cancer and also has applications in breast cancer and head and neck cancer. Developed by NOMOS Corporation in Pennsylvania, the new technology provides a continuous stream of ultrasound images that can be utilized in real time to localize cancer targets prior to a patient undergoing radiation treatment. Physicians and therapists can move and align what are called "structure sets" with the touch of a finger, assuring a level of accuracy and precision previously not available. "This new tumor tracking devise leads to greater precision by providing the localization of tumor targets from any angle or direction," says Michael Steinberg, M.D., of the center. "We can literally cycle through hundreds of anatomical planes and position a treatment plan to precisely match the patient's anatomy -- and that minimizes the impact of radiation on surrounding healthy tissues." Recent years have seen tremendous technological advances in the field of radiation oncology. The most sophisticated technology available today [...]

1/11/2005 Karen Pihl-Carey BioWorld Online (www.bioworld.com) Providing new hope for breast cancer patients, Abraxane soon will offer the antitumor benefits, without the toxic solvent side effects, of paclitaxel. The FDA approved the product developed by American Bioscience Inc., of Santa Monica, Calif. It will be manufactured and marketed through the company's 70 percent-owned subsidiary American Pharmaceutical Partners Inc. (APP), of Schaumburg, Ill. "What this means to the breast cancer patient and to the physician is they can now provide the full potential of this drug paclitaxel," said Patrick Soon-Shiong, chairman, president and CEO of privately held American Bioscience and executive chairman of APP. Abraxane is indicated to treat breast cancer after failure of combination chemotherapy for metastatic disease or relapse within six months of adjuvant chemotherapy. With the approval, the FDA has designated a new group of protein-bound particle drugs in which Abraxane is the first in the class. The product consists of albumin-bound paclitaxel nanoparticles, which are one-hundredth the size of a single red blood cell. "What is exciting now about Abraxane is it is the first of a new class of drug products, and second, it is the first taxane that is free of solvent," Soon-Shiong told BioWorld Today. "As a result, it can be given without premedication and without a black box warning of severe hypersensitivity reactions. "It can be given at a 50 percent higher dose of chemotherapy," he said, "and the outcome is an almost doubling of the response rate when compared to Taxol." Another [...]

1/11/2005 London, England Rebecca Smith London Evening Standard (as reported in www.thislondon.co.uk) A man has received almost £200,000 after being wrongly told that he had throat cancer and had 12 months to live. Alan Brant was "devastated" when doctors told him he had to undergo surgery to remove most of his gullet. The mistaken diagnosis cost him his relationship and he almost lost his job. Complications left him dangerously ill and he has long-term side-effects as a result of the treatment. Tests carried out after the surgery revealed Mr Brant, 54, had never had cancer. He has been given £192,000 in compensation after doctors owned up to making a horrendous mistake. "I have gone through all this for nothing and for about six months I was suicidal," he said. "The effect on my life has been devastating." Complications during surgery meant Mr Brant's spleen had to be removed and he developed pneumonia and a dangerous abscess in his lung. After further treatment he cannot eat proper meals. He has to eat small snacks and cannot have food and drink together. He also has problems with stomach acid coming up into his mouth. Mr Brant, from Woking, said his relationship broke down under the stress and his job as a commercial kitchens designer suffered. His ordeal began when he experienced difficulties swallowing. His GP referred him to a consultant gastroenterologist at St Peter's Hospital in Chertsey, Surrey, who said there was an obstruction and took a biopsy. Then doctors told Mr [...]

1/10/2005 Lexington, Kentucky Ohio State's James Cancer Hospital as reported by Lex18.com The next time you're in the grocery store, try to find fresh black raspberries. Even when they're in season they can be hard to find, which is too bad, because scientists say black raspberries may be a potent cancer fighter. So how can you get the benefits of the berries year-round? The answer might be in America's love of snacking. Researchers at Ohio State's James Cancer Hospital have already shown that black raspberries may help prevent colon and esophageal cancers. Now, their latest studies suggest the berries may help battle oral cancer as well. In lab tests, the berries reduced tumors in the mouth by 44 percent. But there's just one problem. "For us, we would need to eat about four cups of fresh black raspberries a day," said Chris Weghorst, PH. D, of the James Cancer Hospital. So, Weghorst set out to concentrate the benefits of the berries into something easy to eat. Something like cancer-fighting lozenges. Now, for the first time, researchers will test these lozenges on oral cancer patients. Doctors will take a sample of tissue from their tumors once, and then do it again after patients have consumed the lozenges for up to three weeks. "We could evaluate the expression patterns in those two pieces of tissue and identify genes that were specifically responding to a black raspberry treatment," Dr. Weghorst said. Chef Renee Bean likes that idea. She has had oral cancer, and [...]

1/10/2005 New Brunswick, NJ The Cancer Institute of New Jersey Help us find out by joining a study being conducted at The Cancer Institute of New Jersey, the state’s only National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center dedicated to cancer research, prevention, treatment and education, in cooperation with the New Jersey Dental School. Mouth Cancer is the most common cancer in the head and neck region of the body and is often fatal. Mild or moderate dysplasia, which may appear as white or grey patches, is a potentially pre-cancerous condition in the mouth. A clinical trial is underway to see the effects of green tea on these white or grey patches. If you have been diagnosed with mild or moderate dysplasia or have white or grey patches in your mouth, talk to your dentist or contact The Cancer Institute of New Jersey to determine your eligibility for this study. If eligible, you will be asked to consume lozenges 8 times a day for 12 weeks and your participation will last for 24 weeks. If interested in participating, please call 1-866-654-9898

1/10/2005 New Brunswick, NJ The Cancer Institute of New Jersey ---------------------------------------------------------- Have You Seen Patients with Oral Leukoplakia or Other Pre-Malignant Oral Lesions? Learn More About a Study of Green Tea in Oral Leukoplakia at The Cancer Institute of New Jersey and The New Jersey Dental School ----------------------------------------------------------- The Cancer Institute of New Jersey 195 Little Albany Street New Brunswick, NJ 08903-2681 (732)-235-CINJ www.cinj.org

1/10/2005 New York, New York Dr. Frank C P. Holstege Nature Genetics (Feb. 2005) as reported by Cancerpage.com The gene expression profile of metastatic head and neck cancer is distinct from that seen with forms that have not spread, a finding that could improve the treatment of this malignancy, Dutch researchers report. For certain cancers, such as head and neck squamous carcinomas (HNSCCs), early detection of metastases to nearby lymph nodes is critical for appropriate therapy, senior author Dr. Frank C P. Holstege, from University Medical Center Utrecht, and colleagues note. Unfortunately, these metastases are often difficult to detect, resulting in inappropriate treatment for many individuals. In the present study, reported in the February issue of Nature Genetics, Dr. Holstege's team describes the identification of gene expression profiles that correlate with HNSCC lymph node metastases. In a training set of 82 HNSCCs tumors, optimal prediction was achieved using the profiles of 102 genes. In a validation set, gene profiling correctly determined the metastatic state of 19 of 22 tumors analyzed. Further testing showing that genetic profiling outperformed clinical diagnosis. "It is highly plausible that expression profiling will, in the future, improve diagnosis and treatment of oral cavity and oropharynx squamous cell carcinomas, particularly by reducing adverse side effects related to overtreatment, but also by reducing the severe risk of fatalities due to overlooked metastases in the case of 'watch and wait' strategies," the authors conclude.

1/10/2005 Providence, Rhode Island Felice J. Freyer The Providence Journal The practitioner claims the title of doctor on his Web site along with a medical degree under a charter from the governments of Liberia and Ghana. Federal agents yesterday raided the office of John E. Curran, a practitioner of "natural healing" who does not have a medical license, after the state medical board received a complaint that Curran was "posing as a doctor." Jason Simonian, a special agent of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's office of criminal investigations, who was among those conducting the raid, said that the Internal Revenue Service and the U.S. Postal Service were also involved in the investigation. But Simonian declined to answer questions about what the agents were looking for. Thomas Connell, spokesman for U.S. Attorney Robert Clark Corrente, said: "I am not in a position to explain why they were there. There is no documentation that is on the public record. There were agents of the Food and Drug Administration and the Internal Revenue Service participating in a law-enforcement initiative." Yesterday, about a dozen agents were searching the office, on the third floor of One Richmond Square, and loading boxes full of bottles and canisters, along with some equipment, into a van. One batch of canisters contained "chocolate almond protein supplement" and another was labeled "BeneFin," with Curran's name printed on the label. Curran's lawyer, Artin H. Coloian, said, "A lot of this stuff is vitamin C. . . . regular stuff, ginger, [...]