11/8/2004 Newcastle, UK Louise Redvers The Evening Chronicle Today is the start of mouth cancer awareness week. Louise Redvers finds out about a rarely-mentioned condition that claims a life in the UK every five hours. Brenda Brady was diagnosed with mouth cancer in January this year. Surgery to remove the tumour has claimed part of her jaw and tongue and left her surviving on pureed foods. At 57, mum-of-two Brenda has had to re-learn how to speak and swallow and still finds both difficult. But despite her ordeal, the retired secretary, who lives in Whitley Bay with her husband John, 59, is refusing to let things get to her. Joking about her operations, she said: "I'm like a patchwork quilt. I've had bone from my leg inserted into my jaw and then soft tissue from my arm to replace half my tongue. "After that they took skin from my thigh to replace where they had taken tissue from my arm, it just goes on and on. I'm back in next week for more work on my tongue. "But my family have been incredibly supportive and my last biopsy results were very positive so that keeps me going." Brenda thinks her mouth cancer developed following other problems she's had with her saliva glands. The tumour was identified in an operation last year and confirmed as cancer in January. "I've never smoked and I only drink a bit socially so I think it's come from the problems with my saliva glands. "I [...]

11/7/2004 no attribution Medical News Today "Conversation Killer" is the theme of this year's Mouth Cancer Awareness Week. The week runs from 7-13 November with the aim of highlighting the growth of a disease that kills 50 per cent of sufferers. The week aims to highlight the ways in which people can protect themselves against the dangers of mouth cancer, namely to stop smoking, reduce alcohol consumption, eat healthily and visit their dentist regularly. In the UK alone, over 4,300 new cases of mouth cancer are diagnosed annually and 1,700 people die of mouth cancer. The disease, often thought to affect mainly older men, is also increasingly finding victims outside its traditional sufferer group. Although the number of women sufferers remains smaller than the number of men affected, the number of newly diagnosed women has risen by 48 per cent during the last nine years. The number of newly diagnosed men has risen by just 16 per cent. Research shows that although 76 per cent of people are aware of a link between smoking and developing mouth cancer, only 19 per cent are aware of a link between alcohol misuse and the disease. Mouth Cancer Awareness Week 2004 is organized by a number of leading national health organisations including the British Dental Association (BDA) and British Dental Health Foundation (BDHF), and supported by Denplan.

11/7/2004 Lyndsay Moss news.scotsman.com Mouth cancer cases could could soar because young people are drinking and smoking more, dentists have warned. Each year in the UK there are around 4,300 new cases of mouth cancer, which affects the lips, tongue, cheek and throat, and 1,700 deaths. But despite this many people are unaware that alcohol is one of the major risk factors for the disease, research has revealed. A survey of more than 200 dentists found that 85% believed the trend in increased alcohol consumption and tobacco use among those aged 18-30 would lead to an increase in mouth cancer. More than half of dentists (55%) also said they feared that cannabis declassification would add to the number of people being struck by mouth cancer. A poll of over 1,000 people, carried out by Denplan, found that only 33% of women and 28% of men were aware that alcohol was a major risk factor for the disease. The research came ahead of Mouth Cancer Awareness Week, which runs from November 7-13, co-ordinated by the British Dental Health Foundation and supported by Denplan. Less than a third of people (31%) believed that drinking alcohol increased the chances of getting mouth cancer. But experts believe that excessive alcohol consumption can increase the risk of mouth cancer by up to 30 times. Dentists are specially trained to detect early signs of mouth cancer which may not always be seen by the patient, such as sores, white patches or lumps in the mouth. But [...]

11/5/2004 Robert Preidt Forbes.com Tobacco use can cause serious oral health problems, including gum disease and oral cancer, says the Academy of General Dentistry. "Not only is tobacco use the leading preventable cause of death and disease in the United States, it also causes serious oral health problems. Our profession wants to inform all patients that tobacco use will cause damage to their oral health," academy spokesman Larry Williams said in a prepared statement. Tobacco use is linked to oral cancer. Signs of this form of cancer include red, white or discolored areas in the mouth, patches or lumps in or around the mouth, difficulty swallowing, and repeated bleeding from the mouth or throat. The five-year survival rate for oral cancer is 54 percent because the disease often goes undiagnosed in the early stages. People who notice any symptoms should see a dentist. Tobacco use also causes tooth loss and gum disease, a chronic infection and inflammation of the gums and surrounding tissue. As the disease progresses, it destroys the bone holding teeth in place. Symptoms include red, swollen or tender gums, bleeding while brushing or flossing, gums that pull away from the teeth, persistent bad breath and loose or separating teeth. Tobacco use also stains and discolors teeth. It can also cause persistent bad breath and trigger a problem called black hairy tongue. This occurs when heavy tobacco use irritates the tongue, causing blackish or dark brown stains to cover most of the tongue surface.

11/5/2004 Brad Kurtzberg Elitestv.com Smokers and former smokers know how difficult it can be to resist that nicotine craving. Nicotine is both physically and psychologically addictive according to scientists which explains why it is often so hard to quit smoking. Today, however, a California study indicates that one single molecule in the brain may be partly responsible for the craving for nicotine possibly leading to better ways to treat nicotine addiction. The use of tobacco products kills more than 4 million people world wide each year including approximately 440,000 Americans. Heart disease, lung cancer, mouth cancer and many other illnesses are considered tobacco related. Nicotine is the drug in tobacco smoke that makes it addictive. The study focused on mice. When scientists altered a particular gene in mice that were hypersensative to nicotine, their behavior changed. Mice that had previously chosen nicotine over food were able to alter their destructive bahvior. 'Dependence-related behaviors, including reward, tolerance, and sensitization, occur strongly and at remarkably low nicotine doses' in the mice, the research team wrote. The pull of the molecule appears to be very strong. 'What we have done is to show that a particular molecule is not only necessary for nicotine addiction, but is sufficient for nicotine addiction,' one doctor who worked on the study said. 'When the particular alpha receptor is activated by nicotine -- and no other receptors -- that is sufficient to produce some of the effects associated with addiction.' Researchers are encouraged by the report but it [...]

11/4/2004 Montreal, Quebec Ross Marowits Montreal Gazette A cancer survivor who started smoking when he was 10 years old was in court Thursday, hoping his class-action lawsuit will secure billions of dollars in damages from Canada's leading tobacco companies. "I'm an example of what cigarettes can do to you,'' Jean-Yves Blais said during a break in proceedings in Quebec Superior Court. "I've lost my health.'' The 60-year-old taxi driver from St-Hubert, Que., lost a lung to cancer in 1997. A year later, he launched the class-action suit with the Quebec Council on Tobacco and Health against Imperial Tobacco, Rothmans, Benson & Hedges, and JTI-MacDonald. He's trying to win up to $100,000 for each of the estimated 40,000 to 45,000 Quebecers who have suffered emphysema or cancer of the lungs, larynx or throat between 1995 and 1998. For six years, he has waited while efforts to have his lawsuit certified have been repeatedly delayed. Joining him in court was Cecilia Letourneau, who says she has been addicted to nicotine since she began smoking in 1964 as a 19-year-old. She filed a separate class-action suit in 2001 that is seeking $5,000 each for an estimated two million Quebec smokers addicted to nicotine. "I'm doing this so in the end future generations can have truthful and complete information about the real dangers related to smoking,'' she told reporters. Family members of smokers who have since died would be covered in both lawsuits. Both plaintiffs say they have been unable to kick their smoking [...]

11/3/2004 Carmia Borek, PhD Integrative Cancer Therapies, Vol. 3, No. 4, 333-341 (2004) Epidemiological studies show that a high intake of anti-oxidant-rich foods is inversely related to cancer risk. While animal and cell cultures confirm the anticancer effects of antioxidants, intervention trials to determine their ability to reduce cancer risk have been inconclusive, although selenium and vitamin E reduced the risk of some forms of cancer, including prostate and colon cancer, and carotenoids have been shown to help reduce breast cancer risk. Cancer treatment by radiation and anticancer drugs reduces inherent antioxidants and induces oxidative stress, which increases with disease progression. Vitamins E and C have been shown to ameliorate adverse side effects associated with free radical damage to normal cells in cancer therapy, such as mucositis and fibrosis, and to reduce the recurrence of breast cancer. While clinical studies on the effect of anti-oxidants in modulating cancer treatment are limited in number and size, experimental studies show that antioxidant vitamins and some phytochemicals selectively induce apoptosis in cancer cells but not in normal cells and prevent angiogenesis and metastatic spread, suggesting a potential role for antioxidants as adjuvants in cancer therapy.

11/3/2004 Hsin-Chia Hung, Kaumudi J. Joshipura et al. Journal of the National Cancer Institute, Vol. 96, No. 21, 1577-1584, November 3, 2004 Background: Studies of fruit and vegetable consumption in relation to overall health are limited. We evaluated the relationship between fruit and vegetable intake and the incidence of cardiovascular disease and cancer and of deaths from other causes in two prospective cohorts. Methods: A total of 71,910 female participants in the Nurses' Health study and 37,725 male participants in the Health Professionals' Follow-up Study who were free of major chronic disease completed baseline semiquantitative food-frequency questionnaires in 1984 and 1986, respectively. Dietary information was updated in 1986, 1990, and 1994 for women and in 1990 and 1994 for men. Participants were followed up for incidence of cardiovascular disease, cancer, or death through May 1998 (women) and January 1998 (men). Multivariable-adjusted relative risks were calculated with Cox proportional hazards analysis. Results: We ascertained 9329 events (1964 cardiovascular, 6584 cancer, and 781 other deaths) in women and 4957 events (1670 cardiovascular diseases, 2500 cancers, and 787 other deaths) in men during follow-up. For men and women combined, participants in the highest quintile of total fruit and vegetable intake had a relative risk for major chronic disease of 0.95 (95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.89 to 1.01) times that of those in the lowest. Total fruit and vegetable intake was inversely associated with risk of cardiovascular disease but not with overall cancer incidence, with relative risk for an increment of five servings [...]

11/2/2004 TB Sun, RL Chen, and YH Hsu Undersea Hyperb Med, June 1, 2004; 31(2): 251-60 Discoveries of the beneficial cellular and biochemical effects have strengthened the rationale for the administration of hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBO2) as an adjunctive therapy for the treatment of osteoradionecrosis (ORN). Malignancies, however, are considered a contraindication for HBO2 because of the possible tumor-promoting effects. The aim of this study was to examine the effects of HBO2 therapy on tumor weight, and to measure the progression of apoptosis and tumor cell proliferating activity in a cultured human oral cancer cell line. Twenty 5-week-old male NODscid mice underwent daily HBO2 of 2.5 atm abs, 90 minutes for 20 treatments. The control group, n = 20, did not undergo HBO2 and tumor weight, apoptosis index, and proliferating activity parameters were compared between the two groups. The results showed no significant differences (p < 0.05) in the whole-body weights, tumor weights, apoptotic index or proliferating activity index between the two groups. By using the apoptosis and proliferating activity assays which were better indicators of tumor cell growth than tumor weight alone, our results suggest that the clinical application of HBO2 does not promote the growth or proliferation of human oral cancer cells. Authors: TB Sun, RL Chen, and YH Hsu Division of Plastic Surgery, Center for Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy, Tzu Chi University, Hualien, Taiwan

11/2/2004 Medical News Editor Medical News Today HSA welcome the clarity from NICE (National Institute for Clinical Excellence) today about dental patient visit frequency guidelines. Yet despite the reduction in demand that this will create, with 12 months to go until the implementation of the new NHS dental contracts, the crisis in NHS dentistry is set to worsen. HSA research shows that even with Government promises to make NHS dentistry better, dentists are already leaving the NHS ahead of the new patient and practitioner contracts and state dentistry is more difficult to access than ever. HSA research released today shows: -- Despite the investment in the NHS over recent years, more than a third of UK adults think that NHS dentistry is getting worse, with only 11% believing it is improving. -- This decline is worse in rural areas, with the experience of 46% adults of NHS dentistry getting worse - reflecting the emphasis in government investment in dental access centres only in major conurbations. -- There are already 11 million adults in the UK without a dentist and there is no doubt that difficulty in accessing and affording dentistry affects the nation's oral health. -- Dentists are already reacting to the new proposed practitioner contract and are leaving NHS dentistry, believing it uneconomic for them. It is not yet known what the new patient contract will hold, even though there is less than a year before implementation. HSA believes the delay will lead to more dentists leaving NHS dentistry, [...]