cancer

3 Lessons From An Alarming Case Of Mistaken Cancer Gene Test Results And Surgery

Date: October 28, 2017 Source: Forbes.com Author: Elaine Schattner A horrifying story broke last week about a 36-year-old Oregon woman who had elective surgery to remove her uterus and breasts. Elisha Cooke-Moore underwent a prophylactic total hysterectomy and bilateral mastectomy, with nipple-sparing reconstruction and implants, after medical practitioners informed her she had cancer-causing genes. Only later, she learned she didn’t have the abnormality about which she’d been informed. There’s a lawsuit. As reported in The Washington Post, Cooke-Moore expressed concerns to a doctor about her family’s cancer history before getting tested for mutations in BRCA-1, BRCA-2 and related genes in 2015. A nurse practitioner reviewed the results and erroneously told her she had Lynch syndrome because of an MLH1 mutation. BRCA testing was “negative.” It’s not clear if any doctor directly reviewed the lab report. An obstetrician-gynecologist informed Cooke-Moore that her chances of developing breast cancer were 50% and for uterine cancer up to 80%. In 2016, at least two surgeons operated. Cooke-Moore discovered the mistake while looking over her medical records: The MLH1 result was “negative,” she noted in 2017. “I am damaged for the rest of my life,” Cooke-Moore told The Washington Post. Never mind the specifics. While it sounds like the plaintiff received egregious care, and I am sympathetic, I see this as a larger story of confusion over genetic test results leading to irreversible harm. My aim here is not to probe Cooke-Moore’s results or the circumstances of her decisions, but to consider the lessons for other patients and doctors. This case [...]

Charlotte Parker2018-02-06T15:02:34-07:00October, 2017|Oral Cancer News|

A Wellness Blogger Who Lied About Having Cancer Has Been Fined $322,000

Source: Motherboard.vice.com Author: Kaleigh Rogers Date: September 28, 2017 There are serious consequences that come from hawking pseudoscience online, including harming your readers or yourself. But in case physical harm isn't enough motivation to quit slinging shady "wellness" advice online, here's another reason: you could wind up getting fined. That's what happened to disgraced Australian wellness blogger Belle Gibson, who has been fined $322,000 for claiming she treated her brain cancer without conventional medicine. Gibson had said she overcame an inoperable brain tumor, stroke, and cardiac arrests through clean eating, and avoiding dairy, gluten, and coffee. Conveniently, these claims helped her to sell her book The Whole Pantry, and app of the same name, raking in nearly half a million AUD. But in 2015, an investigation by Australian Women's Weekly—complete with Gibson's confession—revealed it was all a hoax. In response, Consumer Affairs Victoria brought a case to federal court, and in March Gibson was found guilty of five breaches of consumer law. On Thursday, Gibson was ordered to pay the fine of $410,000 AUD ($322,000 USD). It's not the first time shady wellness tips have caused controversy for bloggers. Gwyneth Paltrow's venture, Goop—the epitome of pseudoscience profiteering—has been called out for flogging all kinds of questionable goods, including a jade vagina egg that some gynecologists warned could cause infections. Or the wellness trend of eating whole aloe vera leaves that led one vlogger to be hospitalized after eating a poisonous agave plant by mistake. When wellness bloggers tell the truth, and really do try to fight off cancer without any conventional treatment, [...]

Charlotte Parker2017-10-29T20:13:04-07:00September, 2017|Oral Cancer News|

Cancer is a fungus’?! We need to get serious about evidence-based treatment

Source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk Date: August 3rd, 2017 Author: Judith Potts Over the last few years I have come across myriad myths about cures for breast cancer – indeed all cancers. Of course, everyone is looking for a treatment which does not involve chemotherapy, a diagnostic test which does not use radiation, or a treatment without side effects. While thermography may be an innovative concept, there is little good evidence that it is effective in detecting breast cancer at an early stageEluned Hughes, head of public health and information at Breast Cancer Now But I have lost count of the number of times I have heard that ‘Cancer is a fungus and Sodium Bicarbonate is the cure’. I have even been sent an amateur video of a man mixing his sodium bicarbonate potion in an extremely unhygienic-looking kitchen. Part of the Cancer Research UK’s website carries ‘10 Persistent Cancer Myths Debunked’ which makes an interesting read – . Alternative therapies abound and all are described as ‘natural’. The word is applied to food, to beauty products and to fabrics – but, all too often, the list of ingredients denies the description. Last week, an email dropped into my inbox introducing me to Dr Nyjon Eccles and describing his work at his clinic in London’s Harley Street – The ‘Natural’ Doctor. Was it referring to his treatments as being ‘natural’ in the sense of pure, unadulterated and complementary, or did he mean that he was born a ‘natural’ doctor? I discovered that Dr Eccles is [...]

Charlotte Parker2017-08-03T15:28:54-07:00August, 2017|Oral Cancer News|

Personalized cancer vaccines successful in first-stage human trials

Source: http://newatlas.com/cancer-personalized-vaccine-success-trial/50402/ Author: Rich Haridy Date: July 9, 2017 A cancer vaccine is one of the holy grails of modern medical research, but finding a way to stimulate the immune system to specifically target and kill cancer cells has proven to be a difficult task. Now two recent clinical trials that have produced encouraging results in patients with skin cancer are are providing hope for the development of personalized cancer vaccines tailored to individual patient's tumors. Both studies focus on neoantigens, which are mutated molecules found only on the surface of cancer cells. Neoantigens prove to be ideal targets for immunotherapy as they are not present on healthy cells. A vaccine's challenge is to train the body's immune cells, known as T cells, to hunt and kill only those specific tumor cells that hold the target neoantigens. In the first trial, at Boston's Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, samples of tumors were taken from six patients with melanoma. The patients were identified as having a high risk for recurrence after first having their tumors removed by surgery. For each individual patient the researchers identified up to 20 neoantigens specific to a subject's tumor. Computer algorithms were then utilized to help the researchers select which specific neoantigens would best stimulate the body's T cells. Those neoantigens were then synthesized, mixed with an adjuvant to stimulate immune response, and injected into the individual patients. Four out of the six patients in this first trial displayed no recurrence of their cancer 25 months after vaccination. [...]

Charlotte Parker2017-07-10T09:33:39-07:00July, 2017|Oral Cancer News|

Study reveals high environmental cost of tobacco

Source: www.cnn.com Date: May 31st, 2017 Author: Jacopo Prisco Details of the environmental cost of tobacco are revealed in a study released Wednesday by the World Health Organization, adding to the well-known costs to global health, which translate to a yearly loss of $1.4 trillion in health-care expenses and lost productivity. From crop to pack, tobacco commands an intensive use of resources and forces the release of harmful chemicals in the soil and waterways, as well as significant amounts of greenhouse gases. Its leftovers linger, as tobacco litter is the biggest component of litter worldwide. "Tobacco not only produces lung cancer in people, but it is a cancer to the lungs of the Earth," said Dr. Armando Peruga, who previously coordinated the WHO Tobacco Free Initiative and now works as a consultant. He reviewed the new report for the WHO. Commercial tobacco farming is a worldwide industry that involves 124 countries and occupies 4.3 million hectares of agricultural land. About 90% of it takes place in low-income countries, with China, Brazil and India as the largest producers. Because tobacco is often a monocrop -- grown without being rotated with other crops -- the plants and the soil are weak in natural defenses and require larger amounts of chemicals for growth and protection from pests. "Tobacco also takes away a lot of nutrients from the soil and requires massive amounts of fertilizer, a process that leads to degradation of the land and desertification, with negative consequences for biodiversity and wildlife," Peruga [...]

Charlotte Parker2017-05-31T11:27:48-07:00May, 2017|Oral Cancer News|

Cancer patients sometimes can’t get coverage at the hospitals they want

Source: Washington Post Author: Michelle Andrews Published: January 15 Getting cancer is scary. Discovering that your health plan doesn’t give you access to leading cancer centers may make the diagnosis even more daunting. As insurers participating in the health marketplace shrink their provider networks and slash the number of plans that offer out-of-network coverage, some consumers with cancer are learning that their treatment options can sometimes be limited. One reader wrote to Kaiser Health News last month saying that she was dismayed to learn that none of the plans offered on the New York marketplace provides access to Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, where she is a patient. Memorial Sloan Kettering is a well-regarded cancer center that is affiliated with the National Comprehensive Cancer Network and the National Cancer Institute.It participates in New York’s Essential Plan, which is available to lower-income people but not to people enrolling in plans with the familiar categories of bronze, silver, gold and platinum. NCCN is an alliance of 27 cancer centers whose physicians and researchers develop clinical practice guidelines that are widely respected. The National Cancer Institute’s 69 designated cancer centers, which are recognized for their scientific leadership and research, can offer patients access to cutting-edge treatments and clinical trials. A 2015 survey found that three-quarters of NCI-designated cancer centers said they participated in at least some exchange plans, and 13 percent said they were included in all exchange plans in their state. Among centers that didn’t participate in any exchanges, [...]

Charlotte Parker2017-01-17T10:48:53-07:00January, 2017|Oral Cancer News|

Why won’t our doctors face up to the dangers of radiotherapy?

Source: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-1089091/Why-wont-doctors-face-dangers-radiotherapy.html Author: Isla Whitcroft It's a life-saver for thousands - but the side-effects can be devastating. A year after he'd undergone treatment for cancer of the tonsils, Richard Wayman felt a painful tingling in his legs. Within weeks, the 59-year- old shopkeeper was struggling to walk. He was admitted to hospital, where doctors carried out scans, X-rays and tests. 'The scans revealed lesions on my lungs, which raised fears that the cancer had spread, so I was admitted to another hospital for a biopsy and, as a result, contracted MRSA and pneumonia,' recalls Richard, from Colchester in Essex. 'From 11-and-a-half stone I went down to eight-and-a-half stone. I thought I was never going to get out of there.' Finally, the lung lesions were diagnosed as a side-effect of the radiotherapy Richard had undergone for his cancer. However, his problems only got worse: a few weeks after a routine tooth extraction, the bone around the extraction started to crumble and become infected. Within months he had an open weeping wound, running from his lower cheek through his jaw and into his mouth. The diagnosis: bone necrosis as a direct result of radiotherapy damage to the jaw. Richard is one of the many thousands of cancer survivors who have developed terrible conditions as a result of the radiotherapy treatment that helped save them. Around 4 to 5 per cent of all head and neck cancer patients suffer problems with swallowing or breathing, fistulas (open holes) in the jaw and gum, loss [...]

Charlotte Parker2017-03-29T19:04:40-07:00December, 2016|Oral Cancer News|

We Now Know Exactly How Many DNA Mutations Smoking Causes

Every 50 cigarettes you smoke gives you one extra DNA mutation per lung cell. Source: The Verge Author: James Vincent A common tactic for people trying to give up smoking is to quantify exactly how much damage — financial or physical — each cigarette or pack of cigarette does. How much does smoking cost you per month, for example, or how much shorter is your life going to be for each drag you take? Well, a new study into the dangers of smoking now lets us measure this damage right down to the number of mutations in your DNA. A research team led by scientists from Los Alamos National Laboratory compared tissue samples from 1,063 non-smokers and 2,490 smokers, examining each individual's DNA to look for mutations. They found that for every 50 cigarettes smoked, there is one extra DNA mutation for each cell in the lungs. Over the course of a year, this means that someone who smokes a pack a day (20 cigarettes) has 150 extra mutations per cell in the lung, 97 per larynx cell, 23 per mouth cell, 18 per bladder cell, and six per liver cell. These changes to the cells aren’t dangerous in themselves, but each one has the potential to turn into a cancerous growth. "Smoking is like playing Russian roulette: the more you play, the higher the chance the mutations will hit the right genes and you will develop cancer," Ludmil Alexandrov, the co-lead author of the study, told the New Scientist. [...]

Charlotte Parker2016-11-04T09:43:28-07:00November, 2016|Oral Cancer News|

Smokeless Tobacco Use and the Risk of Head and Neck Cancer: Pooled Analysis of US Studies in the INHANCE Consortium.

Source: www.pubmed.gov Author: Wyss AB, Gillison ML, Olshan AF Abstract Previous studies on smokeless tobacco use and head and neck cancer (HNC) have found inconsistent and often imprecise estimates, with limited control for cigarette smoking. Using pooled data from 11 US case-control studies (1981-2006) of oral, pharyngeal, and laryngeal cancers (6,772 cases and 8,375 controls) in the International Head and Neck Cancer Epidemiology (INHANCE) Consortium, we applied hierarchical logistic regression to estimate odds ratios and 95% confidence intervals for ever use, frequency of use, and duration of use of snuff and chewing tobacco separately for never and ever cigarette smokers. Ever use (versus never use) of snuff was strongly associated with HNC among never cigarette smokers (odds ratio (OR) = 1.71, 95% confidence interval (CI): 1.08, 2.70), particularly for oral cavity cancers (OR = 3.01, 95% CI: 1.63, 5.55). Although ever (versus never) tobacco chewing was weakly associated with HNC among never cigarette smokers (OR = 1.20, 95% CI: 0.81, 1.77), analyses restricted to cancers of the oral cavity showed a stronger association (OR = 1.81, 95% CI: 1.04, 3.17). Few or no associations between each type of smokeless tobacco and HNC were observed among ever cigarette smokers, possibly reflecting residual confounding by smoking. Smokeless tobacco use appears to be associated with HNC, especially oral cancers, with snuff being more strongly associated than chewing tobacco. © The Author 2016. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. All rights reserved. *This news story [...]

Charlotte Parker2016-10-31T14:31:13-07:00October, 2016|Oral Cancer News|

America’s Most Popular ‘Legal’ Drug is Responsible for 25% of ALL Cancer

Source: www.thefreethoughtproject.com Author: John Vibes There are many factors contributing to the massive rise in cancer cases in the US, but according to a new study from the American Cancer Society, cigarette smoke is by far the leading cause. The study found that roughly 25% of all cancer deaths could be attributed to cigarette smoking. Although cigarette smoking has waned somewhat in recent years, nearly 40 million adults in the U.S. currently smoke cigarettes. The CDC says cigarette smoking is the leading cause of preventable disease and death in the U.S., responsible for more than 480,000 deaths annually. According to the study: We estimate that at least 167 133 cancer deaths in the United States in 2014 (28.6% of all cancer deaths; 95% CI, 28.2%-28.8%) were attributable to cigarette smoking. Among men, the proportion of cancer deaths attributable to smoking ranged from a low of 21.8% in Utah (95% CI, 19.9%-23.5%) to a high of 39.5% in Arkansas (95% CI, 36.9%-41.7%), but was at least 30% in every state except Utah. Among women, the proportion ranged from 11.1% in Utah (95% CI, 9.6%-12.3%) to 29.0% in Kentucky (95% CI, 27.2%-30.7%) and was at least 20% in all states except Utah, California, and Hawaii. Nine of the top 10 ranked states for men and 6 of the top 10 ranked states for women were located in the South. In men, smoking explained nearly 40% of cancer deaths in the top 5 ranked states (Arkansas, Louisiana, Tennessee, West Virginia, and Kentucky). In women, [...]

Charlotte Parker2016-10-31T12:31:03-07:00October, 2016|Oral Cancer News|