On the pulse....for people affected by breast cancer

Cancerkin’s news update….

New Year

We would like to welcome you back to On the pulse in 2010 and wish all our readers a very happy new year! We look forward to hearing your views and seeing you at the Cancerkin Centre.

Appointments

May we please remind all patients that if you are unable to attend an appointment booked at the Centre (or if you are going to be late), you should please contact us (as early as possible) to let us know. We realise that there are many reasons why you may not be able to make it in, not least because of the very cold and icy start to the year, or you may be feeling unwell, but please do give us as much advance notice as possible. If you are unable to telephone, then please ask someone to call for you. Appointments with our therapists are much in demand and we want to ensure that as many of our patients as possible get to benefit from all the treatments and therapies on offer.

In the news…

‘Junk DNA’

Cancer Research UK scientists have found that a group of rogue genetic messengers, produced by DNA sequences commonly known as ‘junk DNA’, may be able to help diagnose breast and bowel cancer. They discovered that 7 of these messengers are more common in breast cancer cells. Lead researcher Dr Christina Tufarelli said:
“The next step is to find out if the switching on of these genes is driving cancer or if they are a result of the cancer. Even if they are innocent bystanders of cancer, they could be useful biomarkers helping us to diagnose or monitor the disease”. She added: “If this’ junk DNA’ does turn out to play a role in cancer then we could be at the tip of the iceberg in understanding a completely new mechanism behind the disease.”
Read more here: junk DNA

Pomegranates

US scientists have carried out tests the results of which suggest that natural compounds in pomegranates may prevent the growth of breast cancer cells, although they were keen to note that these early findings do not mean that eating pomegranates will prevent or treat the disease. Researchers were investigating whether chemicals in this fruit could block the action of aromatase, an enzyme which plays a key role in driving the growth of hormone dependent forms of breast cancer. The findings have been published in the journal Cancer Prevention Research. Read more here: Pomegranates

More on scans

A letter published in the Guardian on 2nd January 2010 to their resident doctor, Tom Smith, asked about the radiation risk of annual mammograms versus tests every three years. The doctor suggested that an annual x-ray delivers a tiny dose of radiation equivalent to what you’d receive in a medium-haul flight and suggested that this had to be weighed against an undetected cancer developing over a three year period. Read his full answer here: The Guardian
There has also been a lot of discussion on this issue in the media in the US in recent weeks. Two studies were reported in the Archives of Internal Medicine, which also published an editorial on the subject of the potential risks of increased cancer cases and deaths caused by what they refer to as the overuse and inappropriate use of CT scans. According to one of these reports, it is possible that 1-2% of cancer deaths in the US every year in future may be due to a cancer caused by a CT scan performed many years earlier. They estimate that 72 million scans were performed in the US in 2007 and concluded that 29,000 future cancers could be related to these scans. The editorial notes:
“A popular paradigm for health care presumes that more information, more testing and more technology inevitably leads to better care. (These studies) counsel a re examination of that paradigm for nuclear imaging.”
In his blog, Dr Len Lichtenfeld, deputy chief medical officer of the American Cancer Society, says:
“CT scans have become the new x-ray. They have replaced the history and the physical. They have become the ‘defensive medicine fallback’ since doctors tell me frequently that they have to get the scan to protect themselves on the very outside possibility that, for example, the patient with a headache may have a brain tumour…”
His view seems to be that too many CT scans in the US are not medically necessary. In addition to his many other views on this topic, he believes that patients need to take more responsibility for their health and participate more in the decision making process. Read more of his blog here: Dr Len's blog

Long term cancer survivors need more support

A story covered in much of the press over the last week was based on a report by Macmillan on the increasing numbers of long term cancer survivors who are not receiving the help they need to deal with their condition. So while the very good news is that an increasing number of people are surviving cancer (of the 2m people currently living with or having survived cancer, over 1.2m were diagnosed more than 5 years ago), the downside is that many are not receiving the long term care and support they need, as they strive to deal with the long term side effects of both the cancer itself and the treatment they received for the cancer. One of these side effects is noted as lymphoedema. It is thought that this situation is likely to get worse as the number of people diagnosed with cancer is increasing by 3.2% per year in the UK. To read Macmillan’s press release, click here

Nicky Waldman (n.waldman@cancerkin.org.uk)
8th January 2010