Quitting smoking before cancer surgery best, study finds

Source: health.usnews.com Author: staff Cancer patients who smoked up until their surgery were more likely to take up the habit again compared to those who quit earlier, a new study finds. The study from the Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa, Fla., included lung cancer and head and neck cancer patients who quit smoking before or immediately after surgery. They were followed for a year after the surgery. "Sixty percent of patients who smoked during the week prior to surgery resumed smoking afterward, contrasted with a 13 percent relapse rate for those who had quit smoking prior to surgery," study corresponding author Vani Nath Simmons said in a Moffitt news release. The significantly lower smoking relapse rate for those who quit smoking before surgery shows the need to encourage patients to quit smoking when they're diagnosed with cancer, the researchers said. The investigators also noted that most of the patients who began smoking again did so shortly after surgery, which shows the importance of anti-smoking programs for patients both before and after surgery. The study also found that patients were more likely to resume smoking if they had a high amount of fear about cancer recurrence, had a higher risk for depression, and were less likely to believe in their ability to quit smoking. "Cancer patients need to know that it's never too late to quit," Simmons said. "Of course, it would be best if they quit smoking before getting cancer; but barring that, they should quit as soon as they [...]

2013-01-28T14:43:06-07:00January, 2013|Oral Cancer News|
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Neoadjuvant chemo does not improve oral cancer survival rates

Source: www.drbicuspid.com Author: DrBicuspid Staff Patients with advanced resectable oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) who undergo surgery do not benefit from improved survival after induction with docetaxel, cisplatin, and fluorouracil (TPF), according to a new study (Journal of Clinical Oncology, November 5, 2012). Study author Zhi-yuan Zhang, MD, PhD, from Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, and colleagues assessed 256 patients with resectable locally advanced OSCC. A total of 222 patients completed the full treatment protocol. They received two cycles of TPF induction chemotherapy (75 mg/m2 of docetaxel on day 1, 75 mg/m2 of cisplatin on day 1, and 750 mg/m2 of fluorouracil on days 1 to 5) followed by radical surgery and postoperative radiotherapy versus upfront radical surgery and postoperative radiotherapy. The primary end point was overall survival. Secondary end points included local control and safety. After a median follow-up of 30 months, there was no significant difference in overall survival or disease-free survival between patients treated with or without TPF induction, the study authors noted. Patients in the induction chemotherapy arm with a clinical response or favorable pathologic response had superior overall survival and locoregional and distant control. "Our study failed to demonstrate that TPF induction chemotherapy improves survival compared with upfront surgery in patients with resectable stage III or IVA OSCC," the authors concluded. The lack of survival benefit indicates that TPF induction chemotherapy without selection could not benefit OSCC patients in general, Dr. Zhang told Reuters Health in a news story. "On the other hand, [...]

2012-11-11T19:34:34-07:00November, 2012|Oral Cancer News|
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Interim results from CEL-SCI’s Multikine Phase III study on head and neck cancer

Source: www.news-medical.net CEL-SCI Corporation announced today that an interim review of the safety data from its open label, randomized, controlled, pivotal Phase III study of Multikine (Leukocyte Interleukin, Injection) investigational immunotherapy by an Independent Data Monitoring Committee (IDMC) raised no safety concerns. The IDMC also indicated that no safety signals were found that would call into question the benefit/risk of continuing the study. CEL-SCI considers the results of the IDMC review to be important since studies have shown that up to 30% of Phase III trials fail due to safety considerations and the IDMC's safety findings from this interim review were similar to those reported by investigators during CEL-SCI's Phase I-II trials. Ultimately, the decision as to whether a drug is safe is made by the FDA based on an assessment of all of the data from a trial. IDMCs are committees commonly used by sponsors of clinical trials to protect the interests of the patients in ongoing trials especially when the trials involve patients with life threatening diseases, and when, as in cancer clinical trials, they extend over long periods of time (3-5 years). The committee's membership should include physicians and clinical trial scientists knowledgeable in the appropriate disciplines, including statistics. The CEL-SCI IDMC includes prominent physicians and scientists from major institutions in the USA and abroad who are key opinion leaders in head and neck cancer and who are knowledgeable in all of the disciplines related to CEL-SCI's study, including statistics. The Multikine Phase III study is enrolling [...]

2012-10-23T07:33:16-07:00October, 2012|Oral Cancer News|
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Blacks with throat cancer get harsher therapy

Source: in.reuters.com Author: Frederik Joelving Blacks in the United States with throat cancer are more likely than whites to have surgery that leaves them unable to speak than to get gentler voice-preserving therapy, according to a study. Previous research has found a similar racial disparity in breast cancer treatment, with blacks more often having the entire breast removed instead of just the cancerous lumps. It's unclear why the disparity exists. But study leader Allen Chen, a radiation oncologist at University of California, Davis, said that poverty, less education and deep-rooted historical biases could all be at work. "There could be an underlying distrust among African Americans where they feel anything less than surgery might be considered quote-unquote experimental," Chen told Reuters Health. He referenced the Tuskegee experiment, conducted by the U.S. government from the 1930s into the 1970s, in which black patients with syphilis went untreated despite assurances to the contrary. "That sort of distrust needs to be addressed or alleviated," Chen said, because voice-preserving treatment for throat cancer, based on radiation and drug therapy, is now the standard. His study, published in the Archives of Otolaryngology - Head & Neck Surgery, is based on data from a US cancer registry including nearly 5,400 cases of laryngeal cancer between 1991 and 2008. About 80 percent of whites had voice-preserving treatment, while the rest had their voice box surgically removed - the traditional approach. Among blacks, 75 percent had the gentler therapy. While that's only a five-percent difference, "I think that's [...]

2012-07-18T06:04:33-07:00July, 2012|Oral Cancer News|
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Facing the facts: HPV-associated head and neck cancers get a second look

Source: www.curetoday.com Author: Charlotte Huff Kevin Pruyne knew he didn’t fit the stereotype of a hard drinker or heavy smoker who one day develops an oral cancer. The 52-year-old mechanic had been working a three-week stint in a remote section of northern Alaska, repairing trucks on an oil field, when he noticed a hard lump beneath his jaw while shaving. For nearly three months, as Pruyne was prescribed antibiotics for a possible infection and then later shuttled between physician specialists, he kept hearing the same thing: the lump could not be cancer. Pruyne only occasionally consumed alcohol and had never smoked. His wife, Kathy, began researching her husband’s symptoms, which included repetitive throat clearing, a nagging sensation that something was lodged in his throat and ringing in his ears. And the lump, which looked like the top half of an egg, felt solid to the touch. This wasn’t some inflamed lymph node from a lingering head cold, Kathy Pruyne says. “He had every symptom [of cancer], but nobody would listen to me.” Pruyne received a diagnosis of stage 4 oral cancer, which started with a tumor at the base of his tongue. He had already begun chemotherapy when he learned that researchers had discovered an association between the human papillomavirus (HPV) and increasing rates of oropharyngeal cancers. He asked that his tissue be tested; the results came back positive. Pruyne says he wanted to know whether his cancer was caused by HPV because “the prognosis is considerably better with HPV-positive cancer.” [...]

2012-07-03T17:34:09-07:00July, 2012|Oral Cancer News|
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Oral sex may cause more oral cancer than smoking in men, researchers say

Source: www.bloomberg.com Author: Robert Langreth A virus spread by oral sex may cause more cases of throat cancer in men than smoking, a finding that spurred calls for a new large-scale test of a drug used against the infection. Researchers examined 271 throat-tumor samples collected over 20 years ending in 2004 and found that the percentage of oral cancer linked to the human papillomavirus, or HPV, surged to 72 percent from about 16 percent, according to a report released yesterday in the Journal of Clinical Oncology. By 2020, the virus-linked throat tumors -- which mostly affected men -- will become more common than HPV-caused cervical cancer, the report found. HPV is known for infecting genitals. The finding that it can spread to the throat and cause cancer may increase pressure on Merck & Co., the second-largest U.S. drugmaker, to conduct large-scale trials to see if its vaccine Gardasil, which wards off cervical cancer in women, also prevents HPV throat infections. “The burden of cancer caused by HPV is going to shift from women to men in this decade,” Maura Gillison, an oncologist at Ohio State University and study senior author, said in a telephone interview. “What we believe is happening is that the number of sexual partners and exposure to HPV has risen over that same time period.” Gillison said she worked with researchers at Whitehouse Station, New Jersey-based Merck several years ago to design a study in men. After Merck acquired Schering-Plough Corp. in 2009, though, the trial “was canceled,” [...]

2012-05-20T20:54:05-07:00May, 2012|Oral Cancer News|
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Study: Oral cancers take financial toll

Source: Dr.Biscuspid.com April 26, 2012 -- The cost of treating individuals with oral, orapharyngeal, and salivary gland cancers is significant, particularly for patients who undergo all three forms of treatment, according to a new study by Delta Dental of Michigan's Research and Data Institute. And for many that is only the beginning of the financial impact of the disease. The project, which involved Thomson Reuters, Delta Dental of Wisconsin, Vanderbilt University, and the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry, began in March 2010. It is the first retrospective data analysis of a large number of head and neck cancer patients in the U.S. analyzing direct and indirect costs and comparing those costs to a matched comparison group, according to the authors (Head Neck Onc, April 26, 2012). Using data from the 2004-2008 Thomson Reuters MarketScan Databases: Commercial Claims and Encounters Database, Medicare Supplemental and Coordination of Benefits Database, Medicaid Multi-State Database, and the Health Productivity and Management Database, the researchers retrospectively analyzed claims data of 6,812 OC/OP/SG patients with employer-sponsored health insurance, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits. They found that, on average, total annual healthcare spending during the year following diagnosis was $79,151, compared with $7,419 in a group comprising similar patients without these cancers. They also found that the average cost of care almost doubled when patients received all three types of treatment: surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy. Healthcare costs were higher for oral cancer patients with commercial insurance ($71,732, n = 3,918), Medicare ($35,890, n = 2,303), and [...]

2012-04-27T10:16:48-07:00April, 2012|OCF In The News, Oral Cancer News|
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Oral gel contains cancer-preventing compounds derived from black raspberries

Source: www.dentistryiq.com Author: Maria Perno Goldie, RDH, MS, with the assistance of Allison Walker Maria Perno Goldie (MPG): I had the opportunity to interview Dr. Susan Mallery, who is a humble as she is intelligent. I had the assistance of Allison Walker, a freelance journalist who has been involved in dental publishing for more than 20 years. Dr. Susan Mallery (SM) is a Professor in the Division of Oral Surgery, Oral Pathology, and Anesthesiology at The Ohio State University, College of Dentistry, in Columbus, Ohio. Her research interests include oral cancer initiation, AIDS-related oral cancer and chemoprevention. Dr. Mallery has published articles in journals such as Cancer Research, Cancer Prevention Research, Molecular Pharmaceutics, Carcinogenesis and Clinical Cancer Research, to name a few. She graduated from The Ohio State University with her DDS and later returned to receive her oral pathology specialty training and a PhD in Pathology. Dr. Mallery is licensed by the Ohio State Dental Board and board certified by the American Board of Oral Pathology and American Academy of Oral Pathology. She belongs to the American Academy of Oral Pathology, American Board of Oral Pathology, American Association for Cancer Research, and is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She is a consultant at The Ohio State University and James Cancer hospitals. MPG: Oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC) will be diagnosed in more than 36,000 Americans this year and has a particularly high mortality rate—as it will kill approximately 8,000 patients this year. As [...]

2012-03-15T11:56:00-07:00March, 2012|Oral Cancer News|
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Erlotinib dose doubled for smokers with head/neck cancer

Source: www.oncologyreport.com Author: Miriam E. Tucker Giving smokers a higher, short-course dose of erlotinib before definitive surgery for squamous cell carcinoma of the head and neck resulted in favorable responses for the first patients evaluated in a small pilot study. Investigators gave 300 mg of erlotinib (Tarceva) to smokers daily and 150 mg daily to nonsmokers who had a waiting period of more than 14 days before scheduled surgery for head and neck cancer. Seven of the 10 patients evaluated so far had partial responses and 3 had stable disease, according to a poster presented at a head and neck cancer symposium sponsored by the American Society for Radiation Oncology. The study was based on recent data in non–small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) patients showing that smokers metabolize erlotinib, an epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) inhibitor, twice as quickly as do nonsmokers (J. Clin. Oncol. 2009;27:1220-6), said lead author Dr. Mercedes Porosnicu of Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center in Winston Salem, N.C. That study established the maximum tolerated dose of erlotinib at 300 mg daily in NSCLC patients who smoke. Dr. Poroniscu’s presentation included the case study of a smoker with a very large oral cavity tumor protruding through his lips. He was described as being in significant pain and unable to eat or chew. The first CT scan showed a tumor of at least 8 cm and there was "significant metabolic activity" on PET scan. "At 6 days of erlotinib treatment, his tumor was obviously smaller and he could [...]

2012-01-28T08:25:19-07:00January, 2012|Oral Cancer News|
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