Faced with a cancer diagnosis, or any challenging life event, you want to talk to someone who has already experienced what you are about to experience. You want to find stories about other people who have overcome adversity, preferably told by the people who went through it first-hand. You want to know what to expect.

Last year, when Katherine Brown’s mother-in-law Ruth was diagnosed with Lymphoma, she went on an internet search to find people Ruth could talk to, who knew what it was like to be diagnosed with cancer, be inspired by the personal stories of triumph over the trials and tribulations of a cancer diagnosis and cancer treatment and cancer survivorship.

After an extensive internet search for the kind of community Ruth could connect with, Brown came up empty-handed. As need is the mother of all invention, Brown decided to create what she was looking for and could not find.

The Cancer Buddy Network is a result of Brown’s vision. At the Cancer Buddy Network, you create an account; tell your story; be a buddy. Newly-diagnosed cancer patients, family members and friends, and cancer survivors are welcome. It is the blend of cancer patients, cancer survivors and the loved ones touched by cancer that brings real life hope and inspiration in cancer community support. The Cancer Buddy Network is a recent web destination and it looks very well done. Stop by and give it a look, add your voice to hope.

Source: The Cancer Blog

CANCER treatment accounted for almost one-sixth of the €900 million paid out by the VHI in health insurance claims last year to more than 500,000 members of its flagship schemes.

This is more than double the amount of money being paid out on behalf of cancer patients five years ago.

Yesterday the country’s largest health insurer released a detailed breakdown of its annual figures before a 12.5% hike in the price of its standard products takes effect at midnight tonight.

Its figures show that the average bill per claimant came to €1,539, with the majority arising from private hospital care.

Cancer treatment accounted for 16% of the hospital and consultants’ bills it accepted.

Altogether, it covered €139m in cancer care and it is only the second time that this area of treatment has led to more claims than heart disease, which has traditionally been the biggest drain on its reserves.

The VHI highlighted this as a significant trend in an Irish context and said it reflected the high costs of drugs prescribed for cancer patients and the introduction of more elaborate and expensive procedures.

A VHI spokeswoman said the figure did not necessarily mean the number of people diagnosed with cancer was rising at the same rate.

Dr Bernadette Carr, Medical Director at VHI Healthcare, said the increases in some areas were borne out in an 18% hike in the cost of claims in its 12-month cycle up to the end of February.

She said: “As a nation we are living longer and therefore require more healthcare. There are operations, treatments and technologies available today that were not available 10 years ago.

“The average claim amount of €1,539 clearly demonstrates the value of private health insurance, not only for serious conditions such as cancer and heart disease but also for more routine, commonplace procedures such as wisdom teeth extraction and mole removal.”

The VHI paid out €28m for drugs prescribed for cancer care last year and separately covered the cost of €1,800 emergency operations for breast cancer.

Spokesperson for the Irish Cancer Society Jane Curtin said the VHI figures hammered home the importance of a proper cancer strategy in a country that has witnessed 22,000 new cases this year alone.

She said: “The trends we are seeing in figures like the VHI’s are no surprise to us because there is now a massive incidence of cancer in Ireland.

“You are also have more cancer picked up and the higher costs involved in better treatment and drugs that are available.”

Source: Irish Examiner

SEATTLE — The Paul G. Allen Family Foundation has given a $5 million grant to the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center for its work on early detection of breast and prostate cancer.

The money will go toward a “proof-of-principle” project testing the theory that certain blood proteins can signal the early development of cancer with high accuracy.

Results of the research could shift the emphasis of cancer care from treatment of advanced disease to early detection of cancer in people known to be susceptible or just starting to develop the disease, said Lee Hartwell, president and director of the Seattle-based center.

Early cancer-detection research focuses on identifying specific biomarkers – tumor-derived or responsive proteins in the blood that can indicate the presence of cancer long before symptoms begin, when the likelihood of finding a cure is highest.

The five-year survival rate for breast-cancer patients whose disease is detected at an early stage is 85 percent to 95 percent, versus just 22 percent for patients whose cancer has spread to distant organs, said Peter Nelson, an associate member of the center’s human biology division, who will serve as the project’s scientific coordinator.

In addition to improving survival rates, Nelson said better cancer-screening tools could help avoid invasive procedures and false-positive test results that lead to psychological stress and unnecessary treatments.

The Allen Foundation was launched in 2004 through the consolidation of Microsoft Corp. co-founder Paul Allen’s six private foundations. It awards grants twice a year to organizations serving people in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Alaska and Montana.

Source: SeattlePi 

THURSDAY, Aug. 31 (HealthDay News) — U.S. scientists are pointing to the full, 18-month-long remission of two melanoma patients as the first evidence that gene therapy can work to beat back cancer.

“I’m not aware of any other gene therapy that’s gotten this far in cancer therapy,” said Dr. Len Lichtenfeld, deputy chief medical officer at the American Cancer Society.

Lichtenfeld said the study, which was conducted by a team at the National Cancer Institute, is the “first real ‘proof of concept’ that this type of approach could really work.”

The findings are reported in the Sept. 1 issue of Science.

The notion that the targeted manipulation of genetic material might help fight cancer has long held a special allure for researchers. However, despite decades of dedicated research, real success — in terms of effective, durable treatments — has remained elusive.

That era may now be over, experts say.

In their research, the NCI team focused on boosting the immune system’s ability to recognize and destroy cancer cells.

To do so, the researchers focused on healthy white blood cells called T-lymphocytes. These cells are naturally designed to identify and destroy “foreign” cells, including those found in tumors. But for many patients with advanced cancer, T-lymphocytes simply aren’t up to the job.

The group at the NCI sought to give these T-cells an extra “boost” to help get the job done.

“In our work, we genetically modify normal lymphocytes to give them the capacity to fight a cancer — then return them to the patient,” explained lead researcher Dr. Steven Rosenberg, chief of surgery at the NCI.

Working with 17 patients with advanced, metastatic melanoma skin cancers, Rosenberg’s team first removed a small sample of normal T-cells from each patient. Next, the researchers genetically engineered the cells to carry a specific cell-surface receptor, one that would help them recognize melanoma cells.

These “re-armed” cells were then introduced back into the patient’s bloodstream, where it was hoped they would gradually replace less-able lymphocytes and mount a fierce, sustained attack against the cancer.

That’s exactly what happened for two of the 17 patients in the study, who quickly went into a sustained remission. “These two patients were treated over a year ago and are now disease-free,” Rosenberg said.

That’s a real breakthrough when it comes to gene therapy, Lichtenfeld said.

“This has real meaning in terms of cancer treatment,” he said. “It isn’t as if the tumor just shrugged a bit and then a couple weeks later came back. These responses have been ongoing over a period of months, and that’s significant.”

Although most of the other patients in the study didn’t fare as well, tests showed that, for most of them, the engineered T-cells did “persist” in their immune systems. That means the new cells survived long enough to make up at least 10 percent of circulating lymphocytes for at least two months after treatment, the researchers said.

So, why didn’t the therapy beat back cancer in those patients? According to Rosenberg, the strategy is still in its rough form, and no one expected that every patient would experience even partial remission. “This is the first time we have ever done this,” he said, “so the kinds of receptors that we are using, the way we are putting them into cells, the way we are changing them — all of that is not optimal.”

Improvements on all of those fronts are underway, however. “We also have better receptors that can recognize many common cancers — lung, breast and colon. Those trials haven’t started yet, but we plan on starting them within the next several months,” Rosenberg said.

Lichtenfeld cautioned that this research is still in its early stages. “It’s not something that’s going to be available tomorrow,” he said. “It’s going to take a substantial amount of work to refine this, find out how effective it truly is, and determine how many people it could help. It’s clearly a first step.”

Still, the achievement is heartening after decades of struggle, he said.

“This is the culmination of a long process of research that’s being going on for many years,” Lichtenfeld said. “And it’s just the beginning of new research that could really hold out hope for patients.”

Source: Forbes

It might be celebrity gossip but news is flying around the internet that Nike has offered Jennifer Aniston a record deal for her celebrity endorsement in exchange for donations that will benefit cancer research. It is being reported Aniston will be appearing in both television commercials and print ads for Nike.

According to the buzz, it might be the most Nike has ever offered for a celebrity endorsement. For Jennifer Aniston? Is she that popular? I am not being snarky. Really I am not. I just didn’t know she was popular on the level that Nike would offer her the most money they have offered anyone for a celebrity endorsement.

Not long ago, Sheryl Crow publicly thanked her family and friends Jennifer Aniston and Courtney Cox for keeping her spirits up during the first days after breast cancer diagnosis. Maybe there is something to the Nike deal. If the amount of money being reported is true, and it is earmarked for cancer charity — then it’s worthy of a mention at The Cancer Blog. We appreciate any sizable donation to cancer research.

While public and private groups, along with researchers and a few drug companies, have been making serious efforts to help smokers quit smoking cigarettes, the tobacco industry has been spiking the level of nicotine in cigarettes, according to a study by the Department of Public Health. Between the years 1998 to 2004, the amount of nicotine in cigarettes has risen by ten percent.

According to Lois Keithly , director of the Massachusetts Tobacco Control Program, “We in public health have tried to spend a lot of time figuring out why people don’t stop smoking.”

Full withdrawal will be felt after the first day of not smoking. But symptoms from nicotine withdrawal are felt within the first 30 minutes after the last cigarette, with smokers reporting cravings within the first hour after the last cigarette. In one hour, smokers reported anger. In three hours of smoking cessation, smokers reported heightened levels of anxiety, sadness and difficulty concentrating. Nicotine is what makes cigarettes so addictive.

The Boston Globe reports when contacted, representatives of the three major tobacco makers in the US declined to comment on the study and would not answer questions about the nicotine content of their products.

Source: The Cancer Blog

The addition of further chemotherapy added to neoadjuvant chemotherapy in patients with esophageal cancer can improve survival. When diagnosed with esophageal cancer the patient is usually given chemotherapy to shrink the tumor before surgery, it also may be accompanied by radiation. This gives a better chance that the tumor will be smaller and can be fully removed. It also is treating the body immediately with systematic therapy in case any cancer cells are circulating in the body.The journal Cancer has published an article from researchers at MD Anderson Cancer Center regarding additional chemotherapy added to the neoadjuvant chemotherapy already given to patients who have locally advanced esophageal cancer.

The study included 130 patients with esophageal cancer who received neoadjuvant chemotherapy plus radiation therapy and their outcomes were compared to 117 patients who received the same treatment plus and additional course of chemotherapy (induction chemotherapy) prior to surgery.

At five years overall survival was 43 percent for those treated with the additional induction chemotherapy before surgery, compared to 28 percent for those not treated with induction chemotherapy.

The researchers concluded that the induction chemotherapy added to the neoadjuvant chemotherapy improved survival.

A chemical found in hard plastics — such as CD cases, baby bottles, food-storage containers, and even electronics parts — has been loosely linked to incidences of breast cancer. Popular opinion cautions that if we were not worried about this news yesterday, we should not be worried about it today — because studies are preliminary and nothing is definitive at this point. But there are definitely two sides to the debate over how harmful these hard plastics may be.

The chemical in question — a pseudo-estrogen called bisphenol-A (BPA) — appears to be absorbed by breast tumor cells, according to a new study published in the August 28 issue of Chemistry & Biology. Previous studies have linked small exposures of BPA to prostate abnormalities in mice that suggest a link between the plastic chemical and human prostate cancer. Some studies even theorize that embryonic and fetal exposure might influence mental retardation and birth defects. And because this pseudo-estrogen is a synthetic material that in human cells can trigger estrogenic effects, breast cancer now comes up as a disease that may result from this questionable chemical.

Critics say that average levels of the chemical found in urine is infinitesimally small — about one part per billion. Some say the results of this research come from in-vitro studies that one expert says can never fully explain human disease. Yet the real crux of the matter, according to another expert, is that we are surrounded by all sorts of chemicals that are pseudo-estrogenic — not just BPA — and it’s the cumulative effects that we do need to worry about.

Source:  CBC News

Recent research indicates that obesity makes ovarian cancer deadlier and more likely to recur. According to physician and senior author of the study, Dr. Andrew J. Li of the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, maintaining ideal body weight is important for many reasons. This is just one more reason to reduce obesity — because obese women suffering from advanced ovarian cancer are more likely to die than women at healthy weights. They also suffer recurrences more quickly. On average, women in the study considered overweight or obese saw an average of 16 months before recurrence while those considered underweight or at a healthy weight saw 25 months.

Perhaps it’s the secretion of adipose tissue that makes tumors less sensitive to chemotherapy. Li said there are ideas on the table — and his team are looking into them. One fact they feel certain about is that obesity does not increase the chances of contracting ovarian cancer. It just shows the odds of survival are diminished once the disease has been contracted.