8/20/2005 Pennsylvania Jennifer Learn-Andes TimesLeader.com Group that urges teens to shun tobacco has formed at Hazleton Area, official says. Luzerne County students reported drinking alcohol, smoking cigarettes and chewing tobacco more often than their peers in other parts of the country, a new survey says. Of nearly 4,000 students surveyed in grades 6, 8, and 10, 50 percent said they have used alcohol, 30 percent have smoked and 11 percent have chewed smokeless tobacco. The starkest contrast between local and national figures is found among students in the 10th grade. Roughly 21 percent of surveyed Luzerne County 10th-graders reported using smokeless tobacco, versus 13.8 percent of their peers nationwide. Other key findings: • About 48 percent of county 10th-graders say they have smoked cigarettes compared to 40.7 percent nationally. • About 74 percent of 10th-graders reported using alcohol compared to 64 percent nationally. Binge drinking ranged from 1.8 percent among sixth-graders to 25.7 percent among 10th graders who reported at least one episode in the two weeks prior to participating in the spring 2005 study. Binge drinking was defined as five or more drinks in a row. Officials of the county and human services agencies say they’re chipping away at all three problems. Luzerne County Drug and Alcohol Director Mike Donahue said his drug prevention specialists recently learned how to start “Busted” chapters in northern Luzerne County schools. Teenagers in the program rally together and think up ways to urge their friends and relatives to shun tobacco. “We’re spreading the [...]

8/20/2005 Hong Kong, China staff China View (www.chinaview.com) The University of Hong Kong announced Thursday a study result that ultrasonic scissors can achieve better surgical outcome than traditional tongue tumor treatments. The Faculty of Medicine of the university has successfully performed glossectomy, the surgical removal of tongue, with the use of the ultrasonic scissors in 14 patients since January 2004. Satisfactory results were obtained while the patients had nearly zero blood loss and none of them developed post-operative complication. The operation results were recently published in an international medical journal "Head and Neck" in August 2005. According to information given by the university, conventional surgical methods for the removal of tongue tumor utilize knife, scissors, diathermy or laser. Those methods can cause severe burn to the wound, resulting in more post-operative pain, inflammation, speech, swelling and potential wound healing problems. Statistics from the Hong Kong Hospital Authority showed that there are about 130 new tongue cancer patients every year. Carcinoma of tongue is more common in men than in women and is associated with chronic consumption of tobacco and alcohol, betel nut chewing and irradiation. Early symptoms include persistently painful tongue ulcer, white or red discoloration.

8/11/2005 Watsonville, CA staff PRNewswire (www.prnewswire.com) Strawberries may be the most effective of the five most commonly consumed berries at inducing cancer cell death, according to a recent study conducted at the UCLA Center for Human Nutrition. The center recently tested extracts of six berries -- strawberries, raspberries, black raspberries, blueberries, blackberries and cranberries -- to determine their ability to induce apoptosis, a process that enhances the death of cancer cells. In one phase of the study, all of the berry extracts exhibited anti-proliferative effects and did so in a dose-dependent manner. The strongest strawberry effects were seen against two types of oral cancer cells and one type of colon cancer cells. A second phase of the experiment measured their ability to induce programmed cell death (apoptosis) against a cyclooxygenase (COX)-II expressing enzyme colon cancer cell. The results showed that the berries were potent inducers of apoptosis in the human colon cancer cells. Navindra Seeram, Ph.D., presented the findings of this study at the International Berry Health Benefits Symposium, June 13-14, 2005. Strawberries account for 75% of the fresh berry volume sold at retail, followed by blueberries, raspberries, blackberries and cranberries, in descending order. Strawberries and other berries contain high levels of the phytochemicals that are believed to be responsible for the protective effects of diets high in fruits and vegetables against chronic illnesses such as cancer, inflammation, heart disease and neurodegenerative diseases. The investigators concluded that more in vivo studies are warranted to investigate the impact of berry phytochemicals [...]

8/10/2005 Germany S. Rohde et al. American Journal of Neuroradiology 26:1804-1809, August 2005 Background and Purpose: Patients with cancer of the oral cavity often present with advanced tumor stages, distant metastasis, or severe comorbidities, which render radical surgery infeasible. The purpose of this study was to investigate the response rate, technical feasibility, and safety of intra-arterial (IA) chemotherapy as palliative treatment in this situation. Methods: From November 1997 to December 2003, 64 patients with histologically proven oral squamous cell carcinoma, classified as inoperable, received IA high-dose chemotherapy with cisplatin as a palliative treatment at our institution. To minimize toxic side effects, sodium thiosulfat was given intravenously. Twenty-eight percent of the patients were female; average age was 61.5 years. Clinical staging of primary tumors was TNM (tumor, nodules, metastases) stage IV in 89%, stage III in 6.3% and stage II in 4.7%. After local chemotherapy, additional radiation of the tumor area or radiochemotherapy was performed in 33 patients. Results: There were no major catheter-related complications or severe side effects of IA chemotherapy. After the first cycle, 10% percent of the patients had complete remission (CR), 35% had partial response (PR), and 43.3% presented with stable disease. Mean follow-up interval was 11 ± 12.9 months. Forty-five patients died after a mean period of 7.6 ± 7.0 months (median, 5.1 months). The overall 1- and 2-year survival rates were 29.5% and 18%, respectively. There was a trend toward longer survival in patients who received subsequent radiation or radiochemotherapy after IA chemotherapy. Conclusion: IA [...]

8/10/2005 Bethesda, MD staff BioCompare (www.biocompare.com) Drinking alcoholic beverages has been linked to an increased risk of upper gastrointestinal cancer and other types of cancer. Researchers looking for the potential biochemical basis for this link have focused on acetaldehyde, a suspected carcinogen formed as the body metabolizes alcohol. In the journal Nucleic Acids Research, scientists from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) report that polyamines – natural compounds essential for cell growth – react with acetaldehyde to trigger a series of reactions that damage DNA, an event that can lead to the formation of cancer. "We've long suspected acetaldehyde's role in the carcinogenicity of alcohol beverage consumption, but this study gives us important new clues about its involvement," says Ting-Kai Li, M.D., director of the NIAAA, part of the National Institutes of Health. "This work provides an important framework for understanding the underlying chemical pathway that could explain the association between drinking and certain types of cancer." The research team, led by P.J. Brooks, Ph.D., of NIAAA and Miral Dizdaroglu, Ph.D., of NIST, examined acetaldehyde's reaction with polyamines, small molecules found in all cells. "Polyamines are usually considered 'good guys,' because they have been shown to protect DNA from oxidative damage," says Dr. Brooks. Yet the researchers found the polyamines facilitated the conversion of acetaldehyde into crotonaldehyde (CrA), an environmental pollutant that has been shown to cause cancer in animals. This chemical in turn altered DNA, generating an [...]

8/10/2005 Italy S. Gallus et al. Annals of Oncology, doi:10.1093/annonc/mdi361 Background: Apples have commonly been described as a healthy food. To understand better their role on risk of cancer at several sites, we analyzed data from multicenter case-control studies conducted between 1991 and 2002 in Italy. Patients and methods: The studies included 598 patients with incident cancers of the oral cavity and pharynx, 304 of the oesophagus, 460 of the larynx, 1953 of the colorectum, 2569 of the breast, 1031 of the ovary and 1294 of the prostate. The comparison group included a total of 6629 patients admitted to the same network of hospitals as cases for acute, non-neoplastic diseases. Multivariate odds ratios (OR) were obtained with allowance for age, sex, study center, education, body mass index, tobacco smoking, alcohol drinking, total energy intake, vegetable consumption and physical activity. Results: Compared with subjects reporting consumption of <1 apple/day, the ORs for 1 apple/day were 0.79 [95% confidence interval (CI) 0.62-1.00] for cancers of the oral cavity and pharynx, 0.75 (95% CI 0.54-1.03) for oesophagus, 0.80 (95% CI 0.71-0.90) for colorectum, 0.58 (95% CI 0.44-0.76) for larynx, 0.82 (95% CI 0.73-0.92) for breast, 0.85 (95% CI 0.72-1.00) for ovary and 0.91 (95% CI 0.77-1.07) for prostate. Conclusion: This investigation found a consistent inverse association between apples and risk of various cancers. Authors: S. Gallus 1*, R. Talamini 2, A. Giacosa 3, M. Montella 4, V. Ramazzotti 5, S. Franceschi 6, E. Negri 1, and C. La Vecchia 7 Authors' affiliations: 1 [...]

8/8/2005 New York, NY staff Financial Express (www.financialexpress.com) Gliding into the operating room for the first time to assist a surgeon, Penelope wasn’t nervous. Unlike other novice medical assistants scrubbing in, “she” felt nothing at all. That’s because Penelope is a robot, a machine that recently made medical history by becoming the first to act as an independent surgical aide during an operation. During a June procedure at New York-Presbyterian Hospital to remove a benign tumor from a patient’s forearm, Penelope responded to voice commands from a surgeon, handing over clamps, forceps and other instruments with her magnetized mechanical arm. Watching with digital cameras, the robot retrieved the instruments when the surgeon placed them down. Inside her computer brain, artificial intelligence software kept track of the implements to ensure none were misplaced and made predictions about what tool the surgeon would ask for next. “Penelope is just the first step,” said Dr. Michael Treat, a surgeon, physicist and lifelong robotics fan who founded the company that developed Penelope. “When you’re in the operating room and you’re trying to fight your way through a difficult trauma case, there could be a machine that’s helping you mind the instruments and not lose things and keep track of stuff, kind of watching your tail for you,” Treat said. “That’s a glorious vision.” It is a vision closing in on reality. Robots are playing an increasing role in surgery and health care across the country. Mobile robots in many hospitals aid patients by filling [...]

8/7/2005 Washington, DC Randy Dotinga Forbes (www.forbes.com) Besides raising the risk of oral cancer, smokeless tobacco -- also known as snuff, dip or chewing tobacco -- appears to boost the odds male users will die from heart disease, according to the largest study of its kind ever conducted. The findings contradict earlier research, finding instead that people who chew or "dip" tobacco are 20 percent more likely to be killed by a heart attack or stroke than nonusers. It isn't clear why smokeless tobacco might contribute to cardiovascular problems, and the study isn't the final word on the issue, said co-author Jane Henley, an epidemiologist with the American Cancer Society. Even so, the research, released this month in the journal Cancer Causes and Control, should give users another reason to kick their habit, she said. Some chew users are ex-smokers who turn to smokeless tobacco to "tide them over" as they try to kick the smoking habit. But "any form of tobacco is harmful to your health," Henley said. "We should be encouraging smokers who want to quit to use nicotine-replacement and other safe therapies." In their study, Henley and her colleagues examined two U.S. surveys of American adults, one spanning the years 1959-1972 and another from 1982-2000. Together, nearly 1 million men filled out questionnaires, including almost 10,000 smokeless tobacco users. The studies encompassed both chewing tobacco, found in pouches and kept between the cheek and gums, and "dip," also known as "snuff," which comes in small tins and [...]

8/7/2005 Cambridge, MA Jennifer Warner WebMD Health (my. webmd.com) New Technology Allows Drugs to Seek and Destroy Cancer Cells A big breakthrough in tiny technology may soon give doctors the power to deliver a one-two punch to cancerous tumors that knocks out cancer cells without harming the surrounding area. The anticancer "smart bomb" is based on a new dual-chamber "nanocell" that allows a staged release of two different anticancer drugs. The first shuts down the blood supply and surrounds the tumor while the second, a dose of chemotherapy, kills the imprisoned cancer cells. "Traditional chemotherapy kills tumor cells directly; some newer drugs work instead by cutting the tumor's blood supply. An innovative approach combines these strategies to pack a double whammy," writes David Mooney, PhD, of Harvard University, in an editorial that accompanies the findings in the current issue of Nature. Early tests of the strategy in mice showed the combined therapy shrank melanoma and lung cancer tumors and extended the life span of most mice by more than 60 days compared with the 30 days achieved by using either drug alone. "The effect of the sequential delivery of these two drugs on tumor growth is dramatic, but we cannot assume a quick translation of these results to therapy in humans," says Mooney. Creating an Anticancer Smart Bomb The technology combines cancer biology, pharmacology, and engineering, says researcher Ram Sasisekharan, a professor in MIT's biological engineering division, in a news release. "The fundamental challenges in cancer chemotherapy are its toxicity [...]

8/6/2005 Chicago, IL staff www.nbc5.com Waitress Believes Throat Cancer Caused By Secondhand Smoke A former waitress is taking aim at former Bears football coach and current restaurant owner Mike Ditka for comments made to The Chicago Tribune about her testimony before the city council. Mary Rondoni was told by her doctors that her throat cancer was almost certainly caused by the second-hand smoke that she breathed at work every day. Rondoni testified to that effect in favor of a proposed smoking ban three weeks ago, NBC5's Phil Rogers reported. Ditka testified against the proposal, but then took it one step further in Thursday's edition of the Tribune when he said of Rondoni and her throat cancer, "One employee stood up and said she thinks -- she thinks -- that the cancer she got is from secondhand smoke. She thinks! She was a waitress!" "I think he should apologize," Rondoni said. Rondoni, who underwent three surgeries, chemotherapy and radiation for her cancer, said Ditka and his colleagues insult cancer victims and workers alike when they speak only of the possibility of losing business. "Shame on those people who are only taking into consideration the profit," Rondoni said. Rogers reported that Rondoni said she expects an apology from Ditka. Dr. Jodi Patel of Northwestern Hospital said there is not a doubt in her mind that secondhand smoke leads to squemous cell carcinoma, which is what Rondoni had, Rogers reported. Some studies suggest nonsmokers are 20 to 30 percent more likely to develop [...]