11/1/2004 Brodhead, WI Ellen Williams-Masson Munroe Times Dale Everson's voice has been stilled, but his actions speak louder than words to illustrate how he feels for his church. The 43-year member of the Congregational United Church of Christ was diagnosed with throat cancer in December 1997 and received chemotherapy and radiation to kill the tumor. Although his cancer was eradicated, continuing throat pain led to surgery in March of 1999 to remove parts of his tongue, esophagus and larynx. Dale Everson has devoted about 200 hours to restoring this bell to mint condition after it was damaged in a move to the Congregational United Church of Christ in Brodhead. "He never complained one time, or questioned God," Dale's wife, Holly, said. "He just asked the doctors, 'What do I need to do?" Dale's positive attitude and sense of humor carried the couple through their challenges, and Holly said that Dale considers the loss of his voice an adequate trade-off in order to be free of pain. "I won this round with cancer," he said. Dale communicates by e-mail, text messaging, gestures and handwriting. When asked if he had any regrets about choosing the surgery, he scribbled with a smile, "Holly talks enough for both." It would be understandable if a cancer survivor chose to withdraw and become self-absorbed as a result of his ordeal, but Everson has donated all his spare time during the past year to a project for his congregation. The members of the Congregational Church of Christ [...]

11/1/2004 Birmingham, England Emma Brady The Birmingham Post A common virus that causes glandular fever may contain clues to what causes some cancers, researchers have found. Scientists at Birmingham University believe the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), which millions of people carry without knowing, can be manipulated to treat tumours more effectively. The study also revealed that a non-prescription painkiller can block the development of some cancers. Hodgkin's lymphoma, gastric and nasal cancer are among the types which researchers have found can be treated preventatively after discovering how EBV triggers cancerous growths. The virus was discovered 40 years ago and occurs worldwide, infecting most people early in life. EBV can then remain a dormant infection in some cells of the body's immune system, usually without causing any harm. Professor Lawrence Young, head of cancer studies, said: "This study helps us to under-stand how the virus contributes to the development of cancer in people with EBV. "It gives us a possible new way of treating these cancers. "These findings will also be relevant to how we develop new therapies for other types of head and neck cancer. "EBV is one of the most common virus infections, it causes glandular fever, but that doesn't mean anyone who has had glandular fever will develop cancer." In the 1960s the mortality rate for heart transplant patients was very high, but Prof Young said this is not due to the organ being rejected. "In those cases, the heart was rejected but because their immune system was low [...]

11/1/2004 Liverpool, England Catherine Jones Liverpool Echo The emotional trauma caused by smoking deaths is at the heart of a new drive launched today. Health chiefs estimate that one million people a year are left bereaved when a loved one dies of a smoking-related disease. A TV advert featuring Bootle smoker Anthony Hicks, 58, is being relaunched as part of the Don't Give Up Giving Up campaign in the run-up to Christmas. The father of two had head and neck cancer as a result of his 20 to 40-a-day habit. He died shortly after the hard-hitting television advert - featuring him in a hospital bed struggling to breathe - was filmed, and before he was able to see daughter Alexandra, who lives in America. New national print adverts carrying the slogan "the effects of smoking always hit home" will show photographs of Mr Hicks with family during happier times. His other daughter Kirsten, 22, has said: "The last time I saw him alive was on a TV screen in December, as I watched the tape of the advertisement. "I sat watching and tears streamed down my face." It is the first time the campaign has addressed the impact of smoking beyond physical health. An estimated 120,000 people die of smoking related diseases each year, 1,000 in Liverpool. NHS Smoking Helpline adviser Marie Murray said: "The impact of smoking is like four double-decker buses crashing and killing everyone on board, every day. "That means every year about a million people - [...]

10/31/2004 Chicago, IL Lindsey Tanner FortWayne.com (Journal Gazette) Beyond the tired clichés and sperm-and-egg basics taught in grade-school science class, researchers are discovering that men and women are even more different than anyone realized. It turns out that major illnesses like heart disease and lung cancer are influenced by gender and that perhaps treatments for women ought to be slightly different from the approach used for men. These discoveries are part of a quiet but revolutionary change infiltrating U.S. medicine as a growing number of scientists realize there’s more to women’s health than just the anatomy that makes them female, and that the same diseases often affect men and women in different ways. “Women are different than men, not only psychologically (but) physiologically, and I think we need to understand those differences,” says Dr. Catherine DeAngelis, editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association. DeAngelis, who became the journal’s first female editor in 1999, says she has made it a mission to publish only research in which data are broken down by sex unless it involves a disease that affects just men or women. And this fall, the office of Surgeon General will issue its first-ever report on osteoporosis. The crippling bone-thinning disease disproportionately affects women, who lose the bone-protecting effects of estrogen at menopause. The report will emphasize prevention – and that it’s not just a woman’s disease – 20 percent of patients are men, said Wanda Jones, director of the Office on Women’s Health at the U.S. [...]

10/31/2004 Ivanhoe Newswire The Traingle & Fayetteville Headlines Combining radiation and chemotherapy to kill cancer cells is often very difficult on patients because of the side effects, but new research shows the results may be worth it. Days like this with her family make it all worthwhile for Ruth Toseland. Three years ago, she was diagnosed with tongue cancer. A portion of her tongue was removed, but the cancer came back. After two more surgeries, she opted for an extreme treatment, radiation combined with chemotherapy. Oncologist Julie A. Kish, M.D., of Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa, Fla., was involved in a national study that may change the treatment of choice for patients at high risk for recurrence. "At two years, the recurrence rate was lower in patients that had the combined treatment as opposed to radiation alone," she said. But the treatment is very hard on the patient. Researchers say four of the 228 patients in the study died as a result of the combined therapy. Still, Dr. Kish says, for some, the tough approach is worth it. "If you can prolong the time until the cancer comes back, which potentially, at some point in time, it may not come back, which we never say because we can't predict that, it's worth going through it." Ruth finished her treatment two and half years ago. So far, the cancer has not returned. Her husband, Michael, said, "We've got a lot to be thankful for. It was touch and go for a [...]

10/31/2004 Ralph W. Moss, Ph.D. Weekly CancerDecisions.com Herb-derived Drug Fights Head and Neck Cancer South Carolina doctors have announced that a drug called M4N shrinks inoperable tumors of the head and neck region. Researchers injected M4N directly into the tumors of eight such patients who were not eligible for surgery. According to press releases, they saw evidence that the agent killed the tumors in these patients, all of whom had advanced, otherwise untreatable forms of the disease. "This study revealed that M4N was generally well-tolerated without direct toxicity," Terry A. Day, MD, told colleagues at the 6th International Conference on Head and Neck Cancer in Washington, DC, August 10, 2004. Dr. Day is Associate Professor and Director of the Division of Head and Neck Oncology Surgery at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC). He is the author of over 150 scientific publications and is president of the Yul Brynner Head & Neck Cancer Foundation. The meeting was sponsored by the American Head and Neck Society (http://www.sic2004.org/). Dr. Day and his colleagues now plan a larger, Phase II study aimed at showing whether, and at what dosage, the drug really works in this intractable kind of cancer. American Society of Clinical Oncology Study Dr. Day's report followed a related one presented a few months earlier at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) convention in New Orleans. At this June 2004 meeting, Frank R. Dunphy, MD, and colleagues from the Duke Comprehensive Cancer Center, Durham, NC (one of the top [...]

10/27/2004 Toronto, Ontario, Canada Press Release Pharmalive.com Viventia Biotech Inc. today announced the results of the first Phase I clinical study completed with its lead product candidate Proxinium™ for the treatment of advanced, recurrent head and neck cancer. The results, which demonstrate documented tumour responses in several patients, were announced at the Rodman & Renshaw Techvest 6th Annual Healthcare Conference in New York. The study, which completed enrollment in 8 months, was primarily designed to assess the safety and tolerability of Proxinium™ monotherapy over an escalating dose range. Patients enrolled in this study had advanced head and neck cancer and continuing disease progression, and the majority had failed previous courses of chemotherapy and/or radiotherapy. Preliminary clinical data from the study strongly support the safety profile of Proxinium™, with the observation of mostly mild treatment-related side effects, such as injection site pain. In addition to positive safety outcomes, Proxinium™ treatment also resulted in several independently verified clinical responses. Of the 24 patients that were dosed in the study, 17 patients expressed the therapeutic target for Proxinium™, from which 14 patients were evaluated for their response to treatment. Of those 14 patients, two patients experienced significant tumour regressions of their treated lesions and four other patients experienced minor tumour regressions, yielding an objective response rate of 43%. Four other patients had stable disease following Proxinium™ treatment. Tumour growth control (objective responses plus stable disease) was therefore achieved in 71% of treated lesions. The historical survival rate for advanced, recurrent head and neck [...]

10/26/2004 Federation of European Cancer Societies EurekAlert.org Combination treatment using the monoclonal antibody cetuximab, along with high dose radiotherapy in the treatment of patients with loco-regionally advanced squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck results in significant improvements in both loco-regional control and overall survival, according to Dr. Jordi Giralt of Val d'Hebron University Hospital, Barcelona, Spain, speaking here today (Tuesday 26th October) at the 23rd Meeting of the European Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology. Head and neck cancers (e.g. oropharynx, hypopharynx and larynx) account for around 5% of all cancers and are responsible for around 200,000 deaths globally each year. The development of head and neck cancers is strongly linked to tobacco use. Squamous cell carcinoma accounts for nearly 95% of all head and neck cancers and the majority of these express the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) that is associated with aggressive tumour growth and poor clinical outcome. Head and neck cancer is normally treated with high dose radiotherapy in combination with surgery. These phase III results were based on data from 424 patients (recruited from April 1999 - March 2002) with a median follow-up of 38 months. Patients with loco-regionally advanced squamous cell carcinoma of the oropharynx, hypopharynx or larynx were randomised to receive either high-dose radiation alone for 6-7 weeks, or high-dose radiation plus weekly cetuximab. Cetuximab is a monoclonal antibody raised against EGFR. It is thought to work by binding to the EGFR so that epidermal growth factors cannot bind and stimulate the [...]

10/26/2004 Salt Lake City, UT Press Release BSD Medical Corporation BSD Medical Corp. today announced that New York University Clinical Cancer Center has installed a new BSD-500 hyperthermia system produced by BSD Medical, Corp. The recently opened Center, which occupies 85,000 square feet between Lexington and Third Avenues in New York City, includes several multidisciplinary specialties for treatment of such cancers as breast and other female cancers, digestive tract, prostate, brain, lung, blood, head and neck, and skin (melanoma). Many of these cancers are applicable for treatment with the BSD-500. BSD Medical expects more and more leading cancer treatment centers to include hyperthermia therapy as an important component of their treatments for cancer. Clinical trials have shown a significant boost in both tumor control and long-term survival when hyperthermia therapy is combined with radiation therapy. In phase III clinical trials where hyperthermia therapy was added to ionizing radiation treatments, hyperthermia improved local relapse-free survival for head and neck cancer from 24% to 68%, 2-year local control of melanoma from 28% to 46%, complete response for recurrent breast cancer from 38% to 60%, 2-year survival for glioblastoma (brain cancer) from 15% to 31% and 3-year survival for advanced cervical cancer from 27% to 51%, as compared to the use of ionizing radiation therapy alone. NYU Clinical Cancer Center addresses a growing demand for comprehensive outpatient care, with 85-90 percent of cancer patients treated in an outpatient setting. Dr. Silvia Formenti, Professor and Chairman of the Department of Radiation Oncology at the [...]

10/26/2004 Haiming Ding et al. Int J Cancer, October 21, 2004 Celecoxib derivatives induce apoptosis via the disruption of mitochondrial membrane potential and activation of caspase 9. Celecoxib is a potent nonsteroid antiinflammatory drug (NSAID) that has shown great promise in cancer chemoprevention and treatment. The tumor suppression activity of celecoxib and other NSAIDs have been related to the induction of apoptosis in many cancer cell lines and animal models. While celecoxib is a specific inhibitor of cyclooxygenase (COX)-2, recent data indicate that its apoptotic properties may also be mediated through COX-independent pathways. In our study, we evaluated second generation celecoxib derivatives, lacking COX-2 inhibitory activity, in a premalignant and malignant human oral cell culture model to determine their potential anticancer effect and mechanisms responsible for the COX-independent apoptotic activity. Celecoxib and its derivatives delayed the progression of cells through the G(2)/M phase and induced apoptosis. The derivatives with apolar substituents at the terminal phenyl moiety of celecoxib greatly enhanced apoptosis and cell cycle delay. Apoptosis and cell cycle arrest appeared to be independent of derivative induced inhibition of PDK1 and phosphorylation of Akt and Erk1/2. Derivatives induced apoptosis was mediated by the cleavage and activation of caspase-9 and caspase-3, but not caspase 8, implicating the mitochondrial pathway for apoptosis induction. Inhibitors of caspase-3 and caspase-9 and cyclosporin A, a mitochondrial membrane potential stabilizer, attenuated derivative induced apoptosis. Inhibition of caspase-3 prevented the activation of caspase 8, while the inhibition of caspase-9 inhibitor blocked activation of both caspase 3 and [...]