Oral Cancer News

Multisite HPV16/18 Vaccine Efficacy Against Cervical, Anal, and Oral HPV Infection

Source: www.oxfordjournal.comAuthors: Daniel Bleacher, Aimee Kreimer, Mark Schiffman, Rolando Herrero, Ana Cecilia Rodriguez, Douglas Lowy, Carolina Porras, John Schiller, Wim Quint, Silvia Jiminez, Mahboobeh Safaeian, Linda Struijk, John Scchussler, Allan Hildesheim, Paula Gonzalez Background: Previous Costa Rica Vaccine Trial (CVT) reports separately demonstrated vaccine efficacy against HPV16 and HPV18 (HPV16/18) infections at the cervical, anal, and oral regions; however, the combined overall multisite efficacy (protection at all three sites) and vaccine efficacy among women infected with HPV16 or HPV18 prior to vaccination are less known. Methods: Women age 18 to 25 years from the CVT were randomly assigned to the HPV16/18 vaccine (Cervarix) or a hepatitis A vaccine. Cervical, oral, and anal specimens were collected at the four-year follow-up visit from 4186 women. Multisite and single-site vaccine efficacies (VEs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were computed for one-time detection of point prevalent HPV16/18 in the cervical, anal, and oral regions four years after vaccination. All statistical tests were two-sided. Results: The multisite woman-level vaccine efficacy was highest among “naïve” women (HPV16/18 seronegative and cervical HPV high-risk DNA negative at vaccination) (vaccine efficacy = 83.5%, 95% CI = 72.1% to 90.8%). Multisite woman-level vaccine efficacy was also demonstrated among women with evidence of a pre-enrollment HPV16 or HPV18 infection (seropositive for HPV16 and/or HPV18 but cervical HPV16/18 DNA negative at vaccination) (vaccine efficacy = 57.8%, 95% CI = 34.4% to 73.4%), but not in those with cervical HPV16 and/or HPV18 DNA at vaccination (anal/oral HPV16/18 VE = 25.3%, 95% CI = [...]

Charlotte Parker2015-10-16T10:10:13-07:00October, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

Alternative Tobacco Products as a Second Front in the War on Tobacco

Source: www.jamanetwork.comAuthors: Samir Soneji, PhD; James D. Sargent, MD; Susanne E. Tanski, MD, MPH; Brian A. Primack, MD, PhD Associations Between Initial Water Pipe Tobacco Smoking and Snus Use and Subsequent Cigarette Smoking: Results From a Longitudinal Study of US Adolescents and Young Adults Importance Many adolescents and young adults use alternative tobacco products, such as water pipes and snus, instead of cigarettes. Objective To assess whether prior water pipe tobacco smoking and snus use among never smokers are risk factors for subsequent cigarette smoking. Design, Setting, and Participants We conducted a 2-wave national longitudinal study in the United States among 2541 individuals aged 15 to 23 years old. At baseline (October 25, 2010, through June 11, 2011), we ascertained whether respondents had smoked cigarettes, smoked water pipe tobacco, or used snus. At the 2-year follow-up (October 27, 2012, through March 31, 2013), we determined whether baseline non–cigarette smokers had subsequently tried cigarette smoking, were current (past 30 days) cigarette smokers, or were high-intensity cigarette smokers. We fit multivariable logistic regression models among baseline non–cigarette smokers to assess whether baseline water pipe tobacco smoking and baseline snus use were associated with subsequent cigarette smoking initiation and current cigarette smoking, accounting for established sociodemographic and behavioral risk factors. We fit similarly specified multivariable ordinal logistic regression models to assess whether baseline water pipe tobacco smoking and baseline snus use were associated with high-intensity cigarette smoking at follow-up. Exposures Water pipe tobacco smoking and the use of snus at baseline. Main Outcomes [...]

Charlotte Parker2015-10-14T12:26:30-07:00October, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

Throat and tongue cancers linked to sexually transmitted virus on the rise

Source: www.theage.com.au Author: Julia Medew The sexual revolution is producing a new wave of throat and tongue cancers among middle-aged people, who are falling victim to a rare side effect of the "common cold of sexually transmitted infections". A growing number of Australians with oropharyngeal cancer are testing positive to the human papillomavirus (HPV), suggesting it has caused their disease rather than smoking or heavy drinking - factors responsible for many head and neck cancers in the past. Oropharyngeal cancer is usually found in the back third of the tongue or the tonsils. In 2014, about 125 Victorians were diagnosed with it. Most were men. An Australian study of 515 patients diagnosed with the condition between 1987 and 2010 found that the proportion of people with an HPV-related diagnosis increased from 20 per cent between 1987 and 1995 to 64 per cent between 2006 and 2010. Over the same period, the proportion of people diagnosed with throat cancer who had never smoked increased from 19 per cent to 34 per cent, suggesting HPV may overtake smoking and drinking as a cause of the cancer in future. American doctors say more oral sex following the sexual revolution of the 1960s probably spread HPV to more people's mouths and throats. Actor Michael Douglas said he believed oral sex was to blame for his HPV-related throat cancer in 2013. But Dr Matthew Magarey, an ear nose and throat surgeon at Epworth and Peter MacCallum hospitals in Melbourne, said while HPV-related throat cancers were [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2015-10-13T08:15:23-07:00October, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

California to big-league ballplayers: Stop chewing tobacco

Source: apnews.myway.com Author: John Rogers California lawmakers have taken the first step toward accomplishing something Major League Baseball could never do: Stop players from stuffing those big wads of chewing tobacco into their mouths during games. With Gov. Jerry Brown signing a bill earlier this week banning the use of smokeless tobacco in all California ballparks, a practice dating to the days of Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb now seems headed toward the sport's endangered species list. Although California is only one state, it is home to five of Major League Baseball's 30 teams, and team owners themselves have been pressing for a ban for years. Last May they got one in San Francisco, home of the reigning World Series champion Giants. In August they got another in Boston, site of fabled Fenway Park, and when Brown signed Assembly Bill 768 on Sunday one was already in the works for Los Angeles. "Major League Baseball has long supported a ban of smokeless tobacco at the Major League level and the Los Angeles Dodgers fully support the Los Angeles City Tobacco ordinance and Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids," the Dodgers said in a statement last month. Major League Baseball still needs buy-in from the players, however, because the statewide ban that takes effect before next season has no provision for enforcement. "The question we've been asked is are we going to have police officers walking around checking lips, and no, that's not the case," said Opio Dupree, chief of staff to Assemblyman [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2015-10-13T07:03:45-07:00October, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

SA Developed Melanoma Drug Now Seen Effective in Fighting Lung Cancer

Source: www.woai.comAuthor: News Radio 1200 WOAI Staff Keytruda, a cancer drug developed largely at San Antonio's START Center, has already proven to be effective in treating advanced melanoma to the point that it is the major part of former President Jimmy Carter's treatment. Now, News Radio 1200 WOAI reports Keytruda has been given 'fast track' approval by the FDA for use in treating lung cancer, the leading cause of cancer deaths in the United States. Dr. Amita Patnaik, a researcher and oncologist at START who helped develop the drug, says the impact of Keytruda on lung cancer patients has been amazing. "Close to 40% of those patients will receive a response," she said. "And of those patients who receive a response, about 80% of those patients will have a long term response." The life saving potential of Keytruda in fighting non small cell lung tumors is obvious. An estimated 221,000 Americans are diagnosed with lung cancer each year, and 158,000 die of the disease annually. Dr. Patnaik says Keytruda is becoming the most successful of what are known as 'targeted therapies,' drugs which trigger the body to take action to fight the cancer. She says both melanoma and lung cancer work essentially the same way to undermine the body's defenses. "The commonality between melanoma and lung cancer is there is a supressive effect of the cancer on the immune system." She says Keytruda essentially overrides that supressive effect, prompting the body to restart its natural immune defenses and fight the [...]

Charlotte Parker2015-10-06T11:11:27-07:00October, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

Research Leader Discusses FDA-Funded Immunotherapy for Head and Neck Cancer

Source: www.onclive.comAuthor: Gina Columbus Brett Miles, MD, DDS The investigational immunotherapy axalimogene filolisbac (ADXS11-001) has emerged as a potentially practice-changing agent in the treatment of HPV-related oropharyngeal cancer. Shown to generate T cells directed against a cancer antigen and neutralize suppressor regulatory T cells and myeloid-derived suppressor cells that protect the tumor microenvironment from an immunologic attack and contribute to tumor growth, ADXS11-001 is the first of its kind—a therapeutic vaccine for the disease. The agent is being examined in an ongoing phase II trial, which was reported as one of 18 recipients of research grants recently awarded by the FDA’s Office of Orphan Product Development. The grants, given to sites for product development in rare diseases, total more than $19 million. The ADXS11-001 grant provides collaborating researchers from Baylor College of Medicine and the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai with more than $1.1 million over 3 years. Eligible patients for the phase II study are newly diagnosed with stage II to IV HPV16-positive oropharynx squamous cell carcinoma who are scheduled to receive ablative transoral robotic surgery. In an interview with OncLive, the study’s surgical principal investigator, Brett Miles, MD, DDS, associate professor of Otolaryngology Head and Neck Surgery, co-chief, Division of Head and Neck Oncology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, discusses the potential of ADXS11-001 in HPV-associated head and neck cancer and other emerging therapies and treatment strategies. OncLive: Congratulations on your study being awarded a research grant from the FDA. How does it [...]

Charlotte Parker2015-09-29T11:26:02-07:00September, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

Patient Support in Oral Cancer: From Sydney to New York to London, survivors and patients interact through an important portal to get through difficult times

Source: www.prnewswire.comAuthor: Press Release NEWPORT BEACH, Calif., Sept. 28, 2015 -- The word "cancer" will incite fear in anyone. When that word comes at the end of a sentence that began with your name, the impact can be life changing. "I had a great job, a beautiful house and a happy family life," recalls oral cancer survivor and Oral Cancer Foundation (OCF) Director of Patient Support Services, Christine Brader. "All that changed once I got sick." Those affected by oral cancer, like Christine, are saddled not only with the physical challenges of treating and surviving the disease, but they must also live with the emotional uncertainty and anxiety that accompanies a diagnosis. OCF's Patient Support Forum (oralcancersupport.org) was created specifically to provide patients with the information, guidance, and support they need to face a cancer diagnosis. Now in its 15th year, it has helped tens of thousands navigate a difficult path. It was nearly 16 years ago that oral cancer survivor and OCF founder Brian Hill began his search for answers. "When I was first diagnosed," Hill recalls, "I was scrambling for the right information. Once inside the treatment world I was faced with decisions about which treatment path was right for me, uncertainties of what would lay ahead, the arrival of complications unexpected, pain, and ultimately a sense of the loss of control and a resulting fear." While hospital support groups and some online chat rooms existed at the time, they fell short of providing the insights, guidance and accessibility necessary [...]

Charlotte Parker2015-09-29T10:04:16-07:00September, 2015|OCF In The News, Oral Cancer News|

“They don’t care:” Hamilton senior left five months without a voice

Source: www.thespec.com Author: Joanna Frketich Donna Thombs has not uttered a word in five long months. The east Hamilton senior is desperate to get her voice back, but has so far faced a waiting list with no room for compassion at St. Joseph's hospital. "It's terrible," mouths Thombs. "They don't care." The only sound is wheezing as she attempts to talk with gestures along with slowly mouthing out words using exaggerated movements. It takes multiple attempts to get across even the simplest words. Often, she shakes her head and just gives up. Credit: Hamilton Spectator Donna Thombs has been living in silence for five months as she awaits an operation to restore her voice following surgery for throat cancer. "Try not talking for one day," she mouths. "I've done it for months. Now, it's really starting to get to me." Thombs says the surgical procedure essential to giving her a voice takes roughly 20 minutes. She came achingly close when it was scheduled for Aug. 26, only to have it cancelled. As of Friday, Thombs had been given no information by the office of head and neck surgeon Dr. Michael Gupta on how much longer she'd have to wait. She'd been told her case was a low priority despite the safety concerns of a woman in her 80s living alone with no voice to call for help. Her relatives phone to check on her but her only way to communicate with them is to knock once to let [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2015-09-23T07:40:20-07:00September, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

No definite symptom index for recurrence in head and neck cancer, small study suggests

Source: Author: In patients treated for head and neck squamous cell carcinoma (HNSCC), there was no definite index of symptoms that indicated local recurrence or second primary malignancy in a small Taiwanese study published online ahead of print in Head & Neck.1 In head and neck squamous cell carcinoma, there was no definite index of symptoms to indicate recurrence or second malignancy. Pei-Hsuan Lin, MD, and fellow researchers from the National Taiwan University examined 136 patients with HNSCC who were diagnosed between January 2010 and June 2014, 32 of whom had local recurrence and 14 of whom had second primary malignancy. “The purposes of this study were to identify an index of symptoms and signs of swallowing disorders that indicate the occurrence of local recurrence or second primary malignancy,” the authors noted. They found that common swallowing disorders and objective transnasal esophagoscopy findings were similar between patients with and without local recurrence or second primary malignancy. “Routine transnasal esophagoscopy examination of patients treated for HNSCC with swallowing disorders is strongly recommended,” the authors concluded. Reference: Lin P-H, Wang C-P, Lou P-J, et al. Evaluation of swallowing disorders by use of transnasal esophagoscopy in patients treated for head and neck cancer. [published online ahead of print September 2, 2015]. Head Neck. doi: 10.1002/hed.24174.

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2015-09-23T07:32:26-07:00September, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

Vaccine law should cover HPV cancers

Source: www.sacbee.com Author: Brandon Brown Vaccines are the most effective way to prevent infectious diseases. Gov. Jerry Brown rightly signed a law that requires, starting July 1, 2016, that all children enrolled in public or private schools or day care be vaccinated against whooping cough, measles, polio and other diseases, regardless of parents’ religious or personal beliefs. But frustratingly, the California mandate does not include the vaccine to protect against cervical, anal and oral cancers, and genital warts. HPV vaccines have been around for 10 years. Three types exist, with the newest providing the highest protection against chronic infection and precancerous conditions among boys and girls. Despite the recommendations of major health groups, national data show only 57 percent of adolescent females and 35 percent of males received at least one dose of the three-dose HPV vaccine series in 2013. HPV vaccine has the lowest completion rate of any vaccine in the United States. There may be several explanations for this. One is the short time that providers have available to stress the need for early vaccination during a normal medical visit, much less to address parents’ concerns about implicitly sanctioning sexual activity. But the vaccine is linked to age rather than sexual activity, and postponing it until after boys and girls start having sex decreases its effectiveness. Another reason for low vaccination rates is that it requires tremendous work, including training health care providers on how to promote HPV vaccine as a cancer-prevention tool similar to hepatitis B vaccine, [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2015-09-23T07:26:41-07:00September, 2015|Oral Cancer News|