Sandy Hutchens Cancer Prevention

The use of screening test for cervical cancer

As it turns out BBC News has reported the use of screening tests other than smears may prevent of more deaths caused by cervical cancer. This is so for women who are over 35.

Italian researchers headed by Dr. Guglielmo Ronco of the Turin Centre for Cancer Prevention studied data on over 90,000 women over three and a half years. The findings were that women who have been tested for the human papillomavirus (HPV) suffered less cancers than women who were tested using the more common smear technique.

Testing for HPV can pick up early pre-cancerous alterations to cervical cells, which means that the correct treatment can be started at an early stage. The director of information at the Cancer Research UK,, Dr. Leslie Walker state that “we might be able to spot the warning signs even earlier and it might, in future, mean that women go for screening less often.”

The good news according to the research is that HPV testing does not require the same amount of testing. Once every five years will do whereas smears need to be done once every three years.

Good for women under the age of 35

Unfortunately this type of testing is not the best one for all women. Since HPV testing is generally more sensitive, it also tends to find problems that, when discovered in younger women, often correct themselves over time and are truly better left untreated. Therefore, the testing is not best suited for women under the age of 35 in order to avoid being over-treated.

We encourage you to read more on this.

Doctor Speaks About Cervical Cancer Screenings

Dr. Bernadine Healy speaks about ACOG’s new recommendations for less frequent pap smears to detect cervical cancer in this video.

Biohit develops cancer fighting capsule

Finnish medical biotechnology group Biohit said Monday it had developed a capsule that could help prevent stomach and throat cancer by neutralising the cancer-causing compound acetaldehyde.

Acetaldehyde is produced from alcohol and sugar by microbes in the mouth. The gastric acid of a healthy stomach generally kills these microbes, but they can survive in an acid-free stomach and continue to produce acetaldehyde there.

“It is clear that acetaldehyde is a class one carcinogenic, or a cancer-causing factor of the worst kind, and it is clear that an acid-free stomach is a risk factor for stomach cancer,” Biohit chief executive Osmo Suovaniemi told AFP.

He said the capsule, developed by Biohit in collaboration with researchers from the University of Helsinki, neutralised acetaldehyde when taken with meals or alcohol and could, therefore, help prevent the development of cancer.

“How many cancer cases it may prevent in the future remains to be seen,” Suovaniemi said, adding it would take years to determine the capsule’s cancer-preventing impact.

Suovaniemi said the drug had received the approval of medical authorities after undergoing clinical testing.

Biohit aims to make the over-the-counter capsules available in Finnish pharmacies during the first half of this year and to start marketing them internationally during 2011 at the latest.

Biohit shares surged on the news and were up by 120 percent at 3.36 euros in late afternoon trading on the Helsinki stock exchange.

With acknowledgment to AFP.

Finding Cancer Prevention Foods

Finding the right foods and nutrition supplements that help prevent cancer is a difficult aspect of research: often, when researchers think that they understand something, a newer study arrives that finds that the opposite is true.

Lung cancer was diagnosed 220,000 times last year and resulted in 160,000 fatalities. Researchers are searching for vitamins that help reduce cancer risk. Beta-carotene was once a contender as an anti-carcinogen. However in 2004, a major study found that in the case of smokers, beta-carotene supplements increased lung cancer risk.

With such reversals in their thinking, cancer researchers are careful to curb their enthusiasm over new studies that may offer hope in lung cancer prevention. However this week, there have been two new studies which have discovered very promising qualities to green tea and green vegetables.

Folic Acid and Phytochemicals

In one study which included over one thousand current or former smokers it was found that people whose diets had been high in folic acid, leafy-green vegetables and those currently taking multivitamins rich in phytochemicals (vitamins A, C, K, folate, carotenoids and lutein) showed lower levels of genetic changes causing lung cancer in smokers.

The second found that compared with Taiwanese smokers who drank at least one cup of green tea a day, smokers who did not drink green tea were almost thirteen times more likely to get lung cancer. Smokers who had genetic variations that put them at greater risk of developing lung cancer didn’t get quite as much protection from green tea as those who didn’t have those genetic variations. But they still benefited.

The polyphenols found in tea, and especially in green tea, have drawn lots of attention as potential cancer-blockers. This study was presented at a conference being held this week in Coronado, Calif., on lung cancer and its molecular origins. It’s sponsored by the American Assn. for Cancer Research.

The leafy-greens study, published in the journal Cancer Research, appeared online Tuesday. Officials of the National Cancer Institute, which funded the study, lauded the study as “well designed.” But in a statement, NCI’s biomarkers research group chief Sudhir Srivastava cautioned that more research would need to strengthen the evidence–even for leafy greens–before it could serve as the basis for dietary recommendations.

The Benefits of Leafy Greens for Lung Cancer