saliva

Test that looks at your spit to tell if you have mouth or throat cancer caused by HPV ‘could save thousands of lives if rolled out for doctors to use’

Source: www.dailymail.co.uk Author: Connor Boyd, Health Reporter A saliva test that diagnoses mouth and throat cancer caused by HPV could save thousands of lives each year, a study suggests. Scientists at Duke University in North Carolina discovered the test was 80 per cent accurate at spotting the killer diseases. Doctors say it is able to detect the cancers early on, giving patients much higher hopes of surviving their battle. Before it can be used in hospitals around the world, further trials will be needed to confirm the technology works. But the researchers are hopeful, claiming the cheaper test - which gives results in as little as 10 minutes - has significant 'potential'. Rates of oral cancers are soaring in the Western world, with the number of patients diagnosed in the UK having doubled in a generation. US doctors have also seen a similar spike in the diseases, which can be caused by human papilloma virus (HPV). The infection – spread through oral sex, as well as anal and vaginal intercourse – is thought to cause around 70 per cent of all cases. Other risk factors include drinking excessive amounts of alcohol over long periods of time and smoking cigarettes. Professor Tony Jun Huang, study co-author, said there are around 115,000 cases of oropharyngeal cancers each year across the world. He said it is 'one of the fastest-rising cancers in Western countries due to increasing HPV-related incidence, especially in younger patients'. Orophayngeal cancer starts in the oropharynx, the back of the [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2019-12-14T11:12:24-07:00December, 2019|Oral Cancer News|

Tackling the complications from oral cancer and treatment

Source: www.medscape.com Author: Tara Haelle Complications from oral cancer and the toxic effects of treatment — including demineralization, caries, fibrosis, candidiasis, pain, sensitivity, and aesthetic concerns — can continue long after any evidence of cancer is apparent, experts reported at the World Dental Congress 2019. One of the major toxic effects is changes in saliva, said Joel Epstein, DMD, director of cancer dentistry at the Cedars Sinai Health System in Los Angeles and director of dental oncology at the City of Hope Comprehensive Cancer Center in Duarte, California. Another problem area — one that is often ignored — is taste, he told Medscape Medical News. And toxic effects are common, he added, citing one study that showed that 16% of patients experienced dental toxicity in the year after undergoing radiotherapy. The rates increased to 36% after 3 years, 55% after 5 years, and 74% after 7 years. For patients undergoing cancer therapy, dentists should look at overall oral hygiene, decay prevention, lip lubrication, dental emergencies, and oral mucosal infections, Epstein told the audience during his presentation on the management of patients with oral cancer, both during and after treatment. Fortunately, there are a lot of things that dentists can help with, he pointed out. For example, fluoride can be used to promote mineralization and chlorhexidine rinse can be used to reduce cariogenic bacteria. And photobiomodulation therapy, or low-level laser light therapy, can be used for the prevention of mucositis, which can be particularly painful, he added. Pain related to oral [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2019-12-04T09:04:47-07:00December, 2019|Oral Cancer News|

UB center helps bring local dental products to market

Source: www.buffalo.edu Author: Marcene Robinson Stocked on the shelves of Western New York pharmacies is a bottle of dry mouth spray Lubricity, a product developed and manufactured locally by You First Services, Inc. with the support of the University at Buffalo Center for Dental Studies. Through the partnership, the UB Center for Dental Studies verified the effectiveness of Lubricity through clinical trials, helping bring the product to market and contribute to the growth of You First Services as a budding employer in the region. Since its establishment in 1988, the UB Center for Dental Studies has built an extensive history of performing scientific and clinical studies for new products by major companies around the world, including Johnson & Johnson and Colgate-Palmolive. However, the center also works with local manufacturers, providing access to cutting-edge technology, state-of-the-art facilities and guidance from experienced researchers. Since its inception, the center has completed more than $15 million in research projects with contracts ranging from $10,000 to $450,000. “Ease of accessibility to university scholars is one of the major benefits of having a research university like UB in our community, said Sebastian Ciancio, DDS, director of the Center for Dental Studies and Distinguished Service Professor in the UB School of Dental Medicine. “Our Center for Dental Studies has helped manufacturers bring a number of useful products to the marketplace to improve oral health of consumers.” Approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2018, Lubricity, works as a saliva substitute for those who suffer from [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2019-07-21T07:52:32-07:00July, 2019|Oral Cancer News|

Oral cancer prognostic signature identified

Source: www.eurekalert.org Author: press release Researchers in Brazil have identified a correlation between oral cancer progression and the abundance of certain proteins present in tumor tissue and saliva. The discovery offers a parameter for predicting progression of the disease - whether cervical lymph node metastasis is present, for example - and points to a strategy for overcoming the limitations of clinical and imaging exams. It could also help guide the choice of an ideal treatment for each patient. The study began in the discovery phase with a proteomic analysis of tissue from different tumor areas using 120 microdissected samples. In the verification phase, prognostic signatures were confirmed in approximately 800 tissue samples by immunohistochemistry and in 120 samples by targeted proteomics. The study was supported by São Paulo Research Foundation - FAPESP and conducted at the National Energy and Materials Research Center (CNPEM) in partnership with the São Paulo State Cancer Institute (ICESP), the University of Campinas's Piracicaba Dental School (FOP-UNICAMP), the Institute of Computing from the same university, the University of São Paulo's Mathematics and Computer Science Institute (ICMC) in São Carlos, and the Dental School of the West Paraná University (UNIOESTE), in addition to other institutions in Brazil and abroad. "The data led to robust results that are highly promising as guides to defining the severity of the disease. We suggested potential markers of the disease in the first phase of the study and verified these markers in the second phase, enhancing the reliability of the findings and [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2018-12-06T12:27:03-07:00December, 2018|Oral Cancer News|

Ask the Dentist: Cancer patients should be aware how radiotherapy can affect saliva

Source: www.irishnews.com Author: Lucy Stock SALIVA – we normally give little thought to our spit but we definitely notice when it's not there. Every day in the UK 31 people are diagnosed with a head and neck cancer. With increasing numbers of people undergoing radiotherapy for head and neck cancers there are more people living with the side-effects of not having enough saliva. Dry mouth, termed xerostomia, is common after radiotherapy. It's not only extremely uncomfortable, it makes speaking and swallowing more difficult and alters how things taste. Food can taste saltier, metallic; you can lose your sense of taste totally; and perhaps even worse, foods can taste foul, like sour milk. Not being able to chew and swallow easily can reduce how much you eat and how well you eat, leading to weight loss and poor nourishment. Saliva performs numerous jobs. It starts digestion by breaking down food and flushes food particles from between the teeth. Crucially, saliva contains minerals such as calcium and phosphate that keep teeth strong. So no saliva means that teeth decay rapidly and extensively. Even voice quality can change. Without enough saliva, bacteria and other organisms in the mouth take the opportunity to grow uncontrollably. Nasty sores and mouth infections, including yeast thrush infections, are run-of-the-mill. Luckily a dry mouth is usually a temporary nuisance that clears up in about two to eight weeks but it can take six months or longer for the salivary glands to start producing saliva again after radiotherapy ends. [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2018-06-06T11:32:58-07:00June, 2018|Oral Cancer News|

Why drinking wine causes very dry mouth, and how eating cheese helps prevent it

Source: www.medicaldaily.com Author: Lizette Borreli The real reason why wine and cheese are often paired together has to do with creating a more balanced mouth feel to prevent dry mouth. Photo courtesy of Pexels, Public Domain At a happy hour, a dinner event, or a winery, we're likely to see wine and cheese together on the menu. This classic food pairing makes it less likely for us to get dry mouth when we drink wine, and science has found out why. The food combination pair of astringent wine with fatty cheese, opposing foods of sensory perception, help create a more balanced mouth feel. In the video, "Why Does Wine Make Your Mouth Feel Dry?" MinuteEarth explains the temporarily leather-like feel in our mouth is linked to the tannins in wine. The over consumption of tannins, like having a few glasses of wine, causes the slippery proteins in our saliva, tongues and cheeks to stick together, which produces a rough feeling on the tongue. Luckily, the bonds between the tannins and proteins are temporary, meaning once the mouth creates new saliva, it will dilute the tannins and carry them away. Instead of waiting for new saliva to develop, there are proteins in fatty foods that will bond with the tannins, rather than our mouth. In a 2012 study, published in the journal Cell, researchers suggest drinking wine and eating cheese together work as the mild astringent cuts fat. Astringents tend to have a strong effect each time the mouth [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2017-06-20T07:20:44-07:00June, 2017|Oral Cancer News|

UC Davis will use dogs to sniff out cancer

Source: www.willitsnews.com Author: staff A university team of physicians, veterinarians and animal behaviorists has begun training a pair of very special canines to sniff out cancer. One of the 4-month-old puppies is Alfie, a Labradoodle. months old. UC Davis clinicians are hoping to advance cancer screenings with the innate olfactory skills of man’s best friend. A university team of physicians, veterinarians and animal behaviorists has begun training a pair of very special canines who may represent high-tech health care on four feet in the effort to better screen for cancer, especially at early stages of the disease. About 4-months old, the puppies Alfie (a Labradoodle) and Charlie (a German Shepherd) are undergoing a rigorous twelve-month training program to develop their abilities to identify the scent of cancer in samples of saliva, breath and urine. According to sensory scientists, the olfactory acuity of dogs enables them to detect odorant concentration levels at 1 to 2 parts per trillion, roughly 10,000 to 100,000 times that of a human. UCD physicians and researchers believe Alfie and Charlie have the potential to add an important diagnostic element to patient care. Cancer is the second leading cause of death in the United States, and early detection of the disease gives patients the best chance of survival. “For the past number of years, we have been developing very high-end, expensive new tests to try and detect the presence of cancer,” said Ralph de Vere White, distinguished professor of urology and director of the UC [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2015-09-13T15:14:35-07:00September, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

HPV DNA detected in mouthwash predicts oral cancer recurrence

Source: www.onclive.com Author: Kelly Johnson The presence of HPV16 DNA is common at diagnosis of HPV-related oropharyngeal carcinoma (HPV-OPC) but rare after treatment. HPV-OPC has a favorable prognosis; however, 10% to 25% of patients experience disease progression, usually within 2 years of treatment. Patients who have HPV 16 DNA in their saliva following treatment of their oropharyngeal cancer are more likely to have their cancer recur, and a prospective cohort study published in JAMA Oncology has shown that a simple mouth rinse can be used to detect it. Gypsyamber D’Souza Gypsyamber D’Souza, PhD, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and fellow researchers monitored 124 patients with newly diagnosed oropharyngeal cancer from 2009 through 2013. They collected oral rinse and gargle samples using 10 mL of mouthwash at the time of diagnosis as well as after treatment 9, 12, 18, and 24 months later. HPV16 DNA was detected in 67 out of 124 of the participants testing positive. Of the 67 patients who had HPV16 DNA in their saliva at the time of diagnosis, five patients (7%) were found to still have traces of HPV16 in their oral rinses following treatment. All five patients developed a local recurrence of oropharyngeal cancer, three of whom died from the disease. “It’s a very small number so we have to be somewhat cautious,” said D’Souza, an associate professor in the Department of Epidemiology at the Bloomberg School and a member of the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center, in a statement. However, [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2015-08-27T14:25:55-07:00August, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

Green tea polyphenol helps kill oral cancer cells by destroying mitochondria

Source: www.medicaldaily.com Author: Chris Weller First it targeted pancreatic cancer. Now it’s moved onto oral cancer. A new study from Penn State University shows the main antioxidant in green tea, epigallocatechin-3-gallate (EGCG), helps kill cancer cells through the destruction of the cells’ mitochondria. While highly effective at eradicating cancer cells, chemotherapy is quickly falling out of practice with doctors who seek targeted treatments. Instead of getting rid of just the harmful cells, chemo attacks healthy cells, which are often found in the hair and the intestines, resulting in the characteristic hair loss and frequent immune system-related illness. “You don’t see these sorts of side effects with green tea consumption,” said Joshua Lambert, associate professor of food science at Penn State, in a press release. Lambert and his colleagues carried out their study by looking at cell cultures, which they injected with the same amount of EGCG a person would normally have in her saliva after chewing green tea-flavored gum. They saw a number of promising reactions. “It looks like EGCG causes the formation of reactive oxygen species in cancer cells, which damages the mitochondria, and the mitochondria responds by making more reactive oxygen species,” Lambert explained. Over time, the mitochondria lose even more of its defenses with a breakdown in the expression of antioxidant genes. In their weakened state the cancer cells eventually succumb to EGCG in full, and they die. This isn’t the first time EGCG revealed its cancer-killing power. In May of last year, scientists from the [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2015-03-30T10:34:12-07:00March, 2015|Oral Cancer News|

Blood test could predict oral cancer recurrence

Source: www.livescience.com Author: Rachael Rettner, Senior Writer A new blood and saliva test that looks for traces of the human papillomavirus (HPV) can predict whether some people with oral cancers will have their cancer come back, early research suggests. It helps to know as soon as possible that cancer has returned, because tumors that are caught early are easier to treat. In the study, the researchers analyzed blood and saliva samples from 93 people with head and neck cancers; about 80 percent of these patients had cancers that tested positive for HPV. All of their cancers had previously been treated with surgery, radiation or chemotherapy. The researchers looked for fragments of DNA from HPV-16, a strain of the virus that is strongly linked with head and neck cancer. The virus may be found in cancer cells that linger in the body after treatment, the researchers said. Among people with HPV-positive tumors, the new test identified 70 percent of those whose cancer returned within three years, the researchers said. "Until now, there has been no reliable biological way to identify which patients are at higher risk for recurrence, so these tests should greatly help [to] do so," study researcher Dr. Joseph Califano, professor of otolaryngology at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, said in a statement. Patients with head and neck cancer typically visit the doctor every one to three months during the first year after their diagnoses to check for cancer recurrence. But new tumors in the tonsils, throat and base [...]

Oral Cancer Foundation News Team - A2014-08-02T11:03:13-07:00August, 2014|Oral Cancer News|