Charlotte Parker, Author at Oral Cancer News

Introducing OraRisk HPV salivary diagnostic test by OralDNA Labs

Source: RDHmag Author: Staff NASHVILLE, Tennessee--OralDNA Labs , a leader in advancing wellness in dentistry through salivary diagnostics and a subsidiary of Quest Diagnostics, recently introduced a OraRisk HPV test. The test is a noninvasive, screening tool to identify the type(s) of oral human papillomavirus (also called HPV). Oral HPV is a mucosal viral infection that is a known risk factor for oral, head, and neck cancers. High-risk types of HPV that persist present an increased risk for cancers in these regions. This test will provide the dental clinician with the ability to establish risk for HPV-related cancers of the oral, head, and neck regions, and determine appropriate referral and monitoring conditions. Squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck, which can be found in the oral cavity, tongue, tonsils, oropharynx, and larynx, affects approximately 40,000 individuals in the United States each year. The most common symptoms of SCCHN include sore throat, earache, hoarseness--and often--enlarged lymph nodes in the neck. Early detection of oral HPV presents an important opportunity to detect those at risk for these types of cancers before symptoms appear. According to OralDNA Labs' Medical Director Ronald C. McGlennen, MD, "The availability of the OraRisksm HPV test marks an important and timely advance in oral diagnostics, because the at-risk profile for oral cancer is rapidly changing." The use of tobacco and heavy alcohol consumption has traditionally been considered to be the primary risk factor for SCCHN, but an alarming number of new cases are being diagnosed each year [...]

Charlotte Parker2010-03-05T21:50:15-07:00March, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

Roger Ebert’s story inspiring local cancer survivors

Source: News Channel 9 Author: Kevin Sims Tuesday on the Oprah Winfrey Show, movie critic Roger Ebert is talking about his battle with oral cancer. That's a fight many folks here in the Tennessee Valley face everyday. And now there's a support group specifically for those survivors. Five days a week, Jeanna Richelson is an engineer at Sisken Steel. 365 days a year, she's an oral cancer survivor. "They found it in the base of my tongue. I had surgery and spent nine days in the hospital," says Richelson. "I had a feeding tube, I was a mess." What a difference a decade makes. Nearly ten years after her diagnosis, Jeanna is cancer-free and is spear-heading that support group for others. "I'm meeting people who are young mothers in their 20's who have oral cancer and they've never smoked," says Richelson. "It used to be the old man's smoking disease but not anymore." When she started her support group last summer, one person showed up for the first meeting. Now they're up to twenty. That's why she says it's so important for celebrities like Roger Ebert to tell their stories. At times, even though she's happily married, Richelson felt like she had nowhere to turn. Now she wears her battle scars proudly. Like the one on her right arm where doctors transplanted a muscle to her tongue. "There are some (victims) that are newly diagnosed and they can see that we have survived it no matter how difficult it is," says Richelson. The hard parts aren't all behind [...]

Charlotte Parker2010-03-05T07:34:53-07:00March, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

Roger Ebert ‘ridiculously happy’ after receiving new computerized voice produced from his own words

Source: NYDailyNews Author: Helen Kennedy Famed movie critic Roger Ebert, who was robbed of speech by throat cancer, has a new computerized voice cobbled together from words he recorded for DVD commentary tracks. "It's nice to think of all these great movies sloshing around and coming out as my voice," he wrote in a column Sunday. Ebert's new voice is a mix of words he said on the DVD critiques for everything from classics like "Casablanca" and "Citizen Kane" to the cult porn film he wrote, "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls." He wrote that he had been using standard computer programs to turn typed text into sound, including one his wife liked where the speaker "had a British accent and sounded like a slightly crabby headmaster." But his own words - taken from original recordings unearthed in warehouses at Warner Brothers, the Criterion Collection, New Line and 20th Century Fox - are a vast improvement, he said. "Yes, 'Roger Jr.' needs to be smoother in tone and steadier in pacing, but the little rascal is good. To hear him coming from my own computer made me ridiculously happy," Ebert wrote. "I played it for (wife) Chaz, and she said, yes, she could tell it was me." Since being diagnosed with thyroid cancer in 2002, and suffering numerous surgeries and some near-fatal complications, Ebert, of Chicago, lost the ability to speak, eat and drink. He uses a feeding tube and needs 24-hour nursing care. He has written poignantly about his [...]

Charlotte Parker2010-03-01T12:21:39-07:00March, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

“Snus causes cancer” – health institute

Source: thelocal.se Author: Staff Swedish snus causes cancer and increases the risk of death from heart disease, according to the National Institute of Public Health. The warning, which will concern many Swedes who have turned to snus as a healthier nicotine alternative to smoking, is based on the institute's analysis of epidemiological and experimental studies carried out by the Karolinska Institutein recent years. Certain studies indicate that snus can also increase the risk of high blood pressure and diabetes, and that children could be born prematurely if mothers use snus during pregnancy. However, the Institute of Public Health said in its report that there is not yet enough evidence to be certain of the effect on births. The institute said that its analysis showed that using snus increased the risk of cancer of the pancreas and of the mouth. But there are no research results suggesting that it causes other forms of cancer. And while there is no evidence to suggest that using snus actually increases the risk of developing heart disease, it is clear that it does increase the risk of death for a person affected, for example, by a heart attack. The details of how much snus is dangerous are not yet known, said Göran Pershagen, professor at the Institute of Environmental Medicine at Karolinska. "There's not enough evidence to say how much the risk increases. But it is clear that snus is not unhazardous - pancreatic cancer is a relatively common form of cancer with a very poor survival rate," he [...]

Charlotte Parker2010-03-01T12:07:28-07:00March, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

Efficacy of the ViziLite System in the identification of oral lesions

Source: Sciencedirect Author: Esther S. Oh DDS and Daniel M. Laskin DDS, MS Purpose Early detection of oral cancer is crucial in improving survival rate. To improve early detection, the use of a dilute acetic acid rinse and observation under a chemiluminescent light (ViziLite; Zila Pharmaceuticals, Phoenix, AZ) has been recommended. However, to date, the contributions of the individual components of the system have not been studied. The present study was done to investigate the efficacy of the individual components of the ViziLite system in providing improved visualization of early oral mucosal lesions. Patients and Methods A total of 100 patients, 39 males and 61 females, age 18 to 93 years (mean age, 44 years), who presented to the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Dentistry for dental screening were examined. There were 58 Caucasians, 29 African-Americans, 5 Hispanics, 6 Asians, and 2 of mixed ethnicity. Thirty-five patients smoked, 53 used alcohol, and 25 both smoked and drank. After written consent, the oral cavity was examined under incandescent light for soft tissue abnormalities. After 1-minute rinse with 1% acetic acid, the mouth was re-examined for additional mucosal abnormalities. Then, the mouth was examined once again using the ViziLite system’s chemiluminescent light. Any lesions detected by these 3 examinations that were clinically undiagnosable were brush biopsied (Oral CDx) for determination of cellular representation. Results In the original examination of the 100 patients, 57 clinically diagnosable benign lesions (eg, linea alba, leukoedema) and 29 clinically undiagnosable lesions were detected. After the rinse, 6 [...]

Charlotte Parker2010-03-01T18:45:46-07:00February, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

Roger Ebert: the essential man

Source: Esquire Magazine Author: Chris Jones It has been nearly four years since Roger Ebert lost his lower jaw and his ability to speak. Now television's most famous movie critic is rarely seen and never heard, but his words have never stopped. For the 281st time in the last ten months Roger Ebert is sitting down to watch a movie in the Lake Street Screening Room, on the sixteenth floor of what used to pass for a skyscraper in the Loop. Ebert's been coming to it for nearly thirty years, along with the rest of Chicago's increasingly venerable collection of movie critics. More than a dozen of them are here this afternoon, sitting together in the dark. Some of them look as though they plan on camping out, with their coats, blankets, lunches, and laptops spread out on the seats around them. The critics might watch three or four movies in a single day, and they have rules and rituals along with their lunches to make it through. The small, fabric-walled room has forty-nine purple seats in it; Ebert always occupies the aisle seat in the last row, closest to the door. His wife, Chaz, in her capacity as vice-president of the Ebert Company, sits two seats over, closer to the middle, next to a little table. She's sitting there now, drinking from a tall paper cup. Michael Phillips, Ebert's bearded, bespectacled replacement on At the Movies, is on the other side of the room, one row down. The guy who [...]

Charlotte Parker2010-02-23T12:40:29-07:00February, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

Oral cancer’s toll, cruel

Source: CNN Author: Madison Park (CNN) -- It brought a tough, All-Star NBA coach to tears this week. And it stilled the voice of a famous film critic. Head and neck cancers are rare, but known to be severe -- they can strip away a person's voice, distort the face and rob the basic abilities to eat, drink and swallow. The cancer can be so disfiguring, some patients seldom appear in public. In a tear-filled press conference this week, Denver Nuggets coach George Karl announced he has a type of neck and throat cancer. Karl said he will continue to coach, but will miss some games and practices. His type of cancer -- a squamous cell tumor found on his right tonsil -- is the most common and expected to be treatable with radiation and chemotherapy. Also this week, Esquire profiled film critic Roger Ebert, who also had a head and neck cancer. He suffered complications from surgery to treat the cancer that had spread to the salivary gland. The magazine published a full-page photo of the film critic, who no longer has a lower jaw. Ebert spent little time feeling sorry for himself: "If we think we have physical imperfections, obsessing about them is only destructive. Low self-esteem involves imagining the worst that other people can think about you. That means they're living upstairs in the rent-free room," he wrote on his blog after the photo published. While Ebert cannot speak, he continues to lambaste bad movies online. Head and neck [...]

Charlotte Parker2010-02-20T22:24:38-07:00February, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

Nuggets’ coach again fighting cancer- this time of the throat

Source: ESPN Author: Ric Bucher Denver Nuggets coach George Karl informed his team Tuesday afternoon that he is in another fight for his life with cancer. Karl, who had been cancer-free since prostate surgery in July 2005, discovered a worrisome lump on his neck about six weeks ago. A biopsy determined that it was "very treatable and curable" form of neck and throat cancer, Karl said, but it will still require an intense program of radiation and chemotherapy that will probably force him to miss some regular-season games. "Cancer is a vicious opponent," he said. "Even the ones that are treatable, you never get a 100-percent guaranteed contract." Treatment will consist of 35 sessions over the next six weeks, for what the Nuggets Web site called squamous cell head/neck cancer. The sessions are expected to leave his throat extremely raw, requiring him to be fed through his stomach in the final weeks. "Keeping up your nutrition is a big part of the challenge," he said. While the condition is treatable, his doctor, Jacques Saari, said Karl faces a taxing treatment regimen. He said the chemotherapy was intended to make the cancerous cells in Karl's body more susceptible to the effects of radiation. Then, he said, "The idea is to really hit it hard with radiation therapy." But the radiation, to be administered continuously for five days a week for the next six weeks, will take a physical toll on Karl, especially during the latter portion of treatment, Saari said. "Coach [...]

Charlotte Parker2010-02-17T15:41:54-07:00February, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

Induction chemotherapy before concomitant chemoradiotherapy improves outcomes of patients with locally advanced head and neck cancer

Source: CancerConsultants Author: Staff Researchers from Italy have reported that induction (neoadjuvant) chemotherapy prior to concomitant chemoradiotherapy improves outcomes of patients with locally advanced head and neck cancer. The details of this Phase II randomized trial were published early online in the Annals of Oncology on December 23, 2009.[1] There have been several randomized and non-randomized clinical trials suggesting that the concomitant administration of platinum-based chemotherapy and radiotherapy is superior to radiotherapy alone for the treatment of patients with advanced head and neck cancer for local and regional control. Most trials, but not all, have also shown a survival advantage for combined treatment. Two randomized trials in the May 7, 2004 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine documented the effects of adding platinum-based chemotherapy to post-operative radiotherapy for the treatment of patients with advanced head and neck cancers. A recent large randomized trial performed by the UK Head and Neck (UKHAN1) trial reported that concurrent chemoradiotherapy reduces recurrences and death in patients with advanced head and neck cancer. However, researchers are still attempting to determine the optimal way to administer radiotherapy and chemotherapy to improve outcomes of patients with advanced head and neck cancer. Previous Phase II non-randomized studies have suggested benefit from neoadjuvant induction chemotherapy prior to the administration of definitive concomitant chemoradiotherapy for treatment of patients with locally advanced head and neck cancer. The current study involved 101 patients with locally advanced head and neck cancer who were randomly allocated to treatment with concomitant chemoradiotherapy alone or to [...]

Charlotte Parker2010-03-05T07:37:01-07:00February, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

Serum prognostic markers in head and neck cancer

Source: Clincancerres François Meyer1, Élodie Samson1,2, Pierre Douville1, Thierry Duchesne2, Geoffrey Liu3 and Isabelle Bairati1 Authors' Affiliations:1Laval University Cancer Research Center and 2Département de Mathématiques et Statistique, Laval University, Quebec, Quebec and 3Medical Biophysics Department, Ontario Cancer Institute/Princess Margaret Hospital, Toronto, Ontario, Canada Corresponding Author:François Meyer, Cancer Research Center, Laval University, CHUQ, HDQ, 11, Cote Du Palais, Quebec, Quebec, G1R 2J6 Canada. Phone: 418-525-4444-15581; Fax: 1-418-691-2970; E-mail: [email protected]. Abstract Purpose: Recognized prognostic factors do not adequately predict outcomes of head and neck cancer (HNC) patients after their initial treatment. We identified from the literature nine potential serum prognostic markers and assessed whether they improve outcome prediction. Experimental Design: A pretreatment serum sample was obtained from 527 of the 540 HNC patients who participated in a randomized controlled trial. During follow-up, 115 had a HNC recurrence, 110 had a second primary cancer (SPC), and 216 died. We measured nine potential serum prognostic markers: prolactin, soluble interleukin-2 (IL-2) receptor-α, vascular endothelial growth factor, IL-6, squamous cell carcinoma antigen, free β-human choriogonadotropin, insulin-like growth factor-I, insulin-like growth factor binding protein-3, and soluble epidermal growth factor receptor. Cox regression was used to identify a reference predictive model for (a) HNC recurrence, (b) SPC incidence, and (c) overall mortality. Each serum marker was added in turn to these reference models to determine by the likelihood ratio test whether it significantly improved outcome prediction. We controlled for the false discovery rate that results from multiple testing. Results: IL-6 was the only serum marker that significantly improved outcome prediction. Higher [...]

Charlotte Parker2010-01-29T19:47:27-07:00January, 2010|Oral Cancer News|

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