Tag Archives: cancer

Gold specks raise hopes for better cancer treatments

Posted on by
Reply

A tiny medical device containing gold specks could boost the effects of cancer medication and reduce its harm, research suggests.

Scientists have completed a study which showed that gold increased the effectiveness of drugs used to treat lung cancer cells.

Experts say that the findings could help researchers use the device to reduce side effects of current chemotherapies by precisely targeting diseased cells without damaging healthy tissue.

Gold is a safe chemical element and has the ability to accelerate – or catalyse – chemical reactions.

Researchers at the University of Edinburgh discovered properties of the precious metal that allow these catalytic abilities to be accessed in living things without any side effects.

Minute fragments, known as gold nanoparticles, were encased in a chemical device by the research team to control these highly-specific reactions in exact locations.

The device was shown to catalyse a directed chemical reaction when implanted in the brain of zebrafish, suggesting it can be used in living animals.

Gold nanoparticles also activated anti-cancer medicines that had been applied to lung cancer cells in a dish, increasing the drugs’ effectiveness.

Some 450 people die from cancer every day in the UK. A cancer diagnosis is made every two minutes. Medications are improving, but often damage healthy cells.

The study was carried out in collaboration with researchers at the University of Zaragoza’s Institute of Nanoscience of Aragon in Spain. It was part-funded by Cancer Research UK (CRUK), and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and is published in the journal Angewandte Chemie.

Dr Asier Unciti-Broceta from the University of Edinburgh’s CRUK Edinburgh Centre, said: “We have discovered new properties of gold that were previously unknown and our findings suggest that the metal could be used to release drugs inside tumours very safely.

“There is still work to do before we can use this on patients, but this study is a step forward. We hope that a similar device in humans could one day be implanted by surgeons to activate chemotherapy directly in tumours and reduce harmful effects to healthy organs.”

Dr Áine McCarthy, Cancer Research UK’s senior science information officer said: “By developing new, better ways of delivering cancer drugs, studies like this have the potential to improve cancer treatment and reduce side effects. In particular, it could help improve treatment for brain tumours and other hard-to-treat cancers. The next steps will be to see if this method is safe to use in people, what its long- and short-term side effects are, and if it’s a better way to treat some cancers.”

Healthcard for Cancer Treatment

Posted on by
Reply

Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana (RSBY), a centrally sponsored scheme, provides health insurance coverage to Below Poverty Line (BPL) families and including other 11 categories of Unorganized Workers (UOWs) who are enrolled under the scheme.

Senior Citizen Health Insurance Scheme (SCHIS) is also implemented w.e.f. 01.04.2016. Under this, health coverage is available for Rs.30,000/- per annum per senior citizen for treatment packages, over and above RSBY entitlement.

Each family enrolled in the scheme is entitled for hospitalization benefits in Government empanelled hospitals (including both private and public). RSBY and SCHIS cover oncology treatment within prescribed benefits ceiling.

Under comprehensive Primary Healthcare, operational guidelines for Prevention, Screening and Control of Common Non-Communicable Diseases: Hypertension, Diabetes and Common Cancers (Oral, Breast, Cervix) have been issued under National Health Mission which envisage preparation of Health Cards for individuals above 30 years of age. These Cards primarily will be health records of individuals listing health issues/diseases/disabilities and exposures to risk factors of common NCDs including cancer.

The Minister of State (Health and Family Welfare), Smt Anupriya Patel stated this in a written reply in the Rajya Sabha here today.

Periodontal disease is associated with higher risk of several cancer types

Posted on by
Reply

Periodontal disease was associated with increased risk of several types of cancer in postmenopausal women, even in women who had never smoked.

Journal in Which the Study was Published: Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.

Author: Jean Wactawski-Wende, PhD, a professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Environmental Health and dean of the School of Public Health and Health Professions, State University of New York at Buffalo, was senior author. Ngozi Nwizu, BDS, MMSc, PhD, assistant professor of oral and maxillofacial pathology at The University of Texas School of Dentistry, was lead author.

Background: In recent years, research has shown that periodontal disease is a risk factor for certain cancers, including breast cancer, oral, and esophageal cancers. However, few studies have analyzed the overall risk for all types of cancers.

How the Study Was Conducted and Results: The researchers conducted a prospective cohort study of 65,869 women aged 54 to 86 who were enrolled in the Women’s Health Initiative Observational Study. The women self-reported periodontal disease on questionnaires administered between 1999 and 2003. The researchers monitored cancer outcomes through September 2013. Over an average follow-up time of 8.32 years, the researchers identified 7,149 cases of cancer.

The study showed that a history of periodontal disease was associated with a 14 percent higher risk of developing any cancer. The strongest association was for cancer of the esophagus, which was more than three times more likely in women with periodontal disease than women who did not report periodontal disease. Lung cancer, gallbladder cancer, melanoma, and breast cancer were also associated with significantly higher risk.

The researchers noted that certain cancers, such as breast cancer, lung cancer, and gallbladder cancer, were associated with higher risk in women who smoked and had periodontal disease. Others, such as melanoma, were associated with higher risk in the women who had never smoked but did report periodontal disease.

Author Comment: Wactawski-Wende said the biological mechanisms that connect periodontal disease and cancer are not yet fully understood. She said one possible explanation is that oral pathogens could potentially be carried in saliva and dental plaque, or through diseased periodontal tissues into the blood circulation to reach other body sites and contribute to carcinogenesis; this may possibly explain the strong association in esophageal cancer.

“The esophagus is in close proximity to the oral cavity, and so periodontal pathogens may more easily gain access to and infect the esophageal mucosa and promote cancer risk at that site,” Wactawski-Wende said.

“Our study findings serve to provide further evidence that periodontal disease is linked to cancer, and support the need for further investigation into how periodontal disease contributes to increased cancer risk,” said Nwizu.

The authors said the study’s large size adds to the strength of the findings.

“This study is the first national study focused on women, particularly older women,” Wactawski-Wende said. “Our study was sufficiently large and detailed enough to examine not just overall risk of cancer among older women with periodontal disease, but also to provide useful information on a number of cancer-specific sites.”

Limitations: The authors said that because the study used self-reported data, the prevalence of periodontal disease may have been under-reported. They said further research that uses more precise assessments of periodontal disease could be useful in confirming the link between periodontal disease and cancer, they added.

History of gum disease increases cancer risk in older women says a study

Posted on by
Reply

Postmenopausal women who have a history of gum disease also have a higher risk of cancer, according to a new study of more than 65,000 women.

The study, led by researchers at the University at Buffalo, is the first national study of its kind involving U.S. women, and the first to focus specifically on older women. It’s also the first study to find an association between periodontal disease and gallbladder cancer risk in women or men. The findings were published today (Aug. 1) in the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention.

“This study is the first national study focused on women, particularly older women,” said Jean Wactawski-Wende, the study’s senior author.

“Our study was sufficiently large and detailed enough to examine not just overall risk of cancer among older women with periodontal disease, but also to provide useful information on a number of cancer-specific sites,” added Wactawski-Wende, dean of UB’s School of Public Health and Health Professions and a professor of epidemiology and environmental health.

The study included 65,869 postmenopausal women enrolled in the Women’s Health Initiative, an ongoing national prospective study designed to investigate factors affecting disease and death risk in older American women. The average age of the participants was 68, and most were non-Hispanic white women.

As part of a follow-up health questionnaire, participants were asked “Has a dentist or dental hygienist ever told you that you had periodontal or gum disease?”

Women who reported a history of gum disease had a 14 percent increased risk of overall cancer. Of the 7,149 cancers that occurred in the study participants, the majority — or 2,416 — were breast cancer.

“There is increasing evidence that periodontal disease may be linked to an increased cancer risk and this association warrants further investigation,” said the paper’s first author, Ngozi Nwizu, who worked on the research while completing her residency in oral and maxillofacial pathology in UB’s School of Dental Medicine and her doctorate in pathology (cancer epidemiology) at UB’s Roswell Park Cancer Institute Graduate Division. Nwizu is now an assistant professor of oral and maxillofacial pathology at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.

The risk associated with periodontal disease was highest for esophageal cancer, the researchers reported. “The esophagus is in close proximity to the oral cavity, and so periodontal pathogens may more easily gain access to and infect the esophageal mucosa and promote cancer risk at that site,” Wactawski-Wende said.

Gallbladder cancer risk also was high in women who reported a history of gum disease. “Chronic inflammation has also been implicated in gallbladder cancer, but there has been no data on the association between periodontal disease and gallbladder risk. Ours is the first study to report on such an association,” Nwizu said.

The esophageal and gallbladder cancer findings are significant, Nwizu said. “Esophageal cancer ranks among the most deadly cancers and its etiology is not well known, but chronic inflammation has been implicated,” she said.

“Certain periodontal bacteria have been shown to promote inflammation even in tiny amounts, and these bacteria have been isolated from many organ systems and some cancers including esophageal cancers. It is important to establish if periodontal disease is an important risk of esophageal cancer, so that appropriate preventive measures can be promoted.”

Periodontal disease also was associated with total cancer risk among former and current smokers.

The findings for this particular age group are significant because they offer a window into disease in a population of Americans that continues to increase as people live longer lives.

“The elderly are more disproportionately affected by periodontal disease than other age groups, and for most types of cancers, the process of carcinogenesis usually occurs over many years,” said Nwizu. “So the adverse effects of periodontal disease are more likely to be seen among postmenopausal women, simply because of their older age.”