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Advertise Subscribe Search Site Map Front Page Nation/Politics World Commentary Editorials/Op-Ed Metropolitan Sports Business Special Reports Technology Entertainment Books Food Wash. Weekend Travel Family Times Culture, etc. Civil War Weather Corrections Photo Gallery TWT Insider Classifieds Home Guide Auto Weekend Employment Health Services Directory Market Place Tourist Guide Holiday Gift Guide International Reports Archive Subscription Services Advertise Germans develop new colon cancer test Giessen, Germany, Aug. 24 (UPI) -- Researchers in Germany have discovered a test for colon cancer that is non invasive, reports the British Journal of Cancer . Scientists at Giessen University Hospital said a chemical from cancer ...

Relative Incidence of Cancer within the Colon in a Population with a Historically High Incidence Rate Eugene J. Lengerich, VMD Juan Wu, MS Alan MacEachren, PhD James Hobley, MD Roxanne Parrott, PhD Thomas McGarrity, MD Brenda Kluhsman, MSS Previous studies have reported substantial variation in the magnitude of the effect of behavioral and genetic risk factors and the efficacy of selected treatment for cancer of specific anatomical sites within the colon . In addition, the utilization of colon cancer imaging has varied by demographic group and geographic location. The purpose of this study was to estimate the incidence of colon cancer and to determine if relative rates were similar for demographic groups and residences in a large geographic area with a historically elevated incidence. This population-based study took place in Pennsylvania which had the 3 rd ...

Katie Couric, coanchor of NBC’s "Today Show," has used her high visibility to draw national attention to colorectal cancer — the disease that killed her husband in 1998 but is treatable if caught early. Out of the public eye, scientists have been striving for more-accurate, noninva- sive techniques to screen for colorectal cancer . The most common clinical test looks for blood in a patient’s feces, but this method has notable flaws. It catches just 30 to 40 percent of colorectal cancers and sounds a false alarm for 5 to 10 percent of people screened. Alternative tests look for cancer -causing mutations in the DNA of cells shed from the colon and rectum into feces. But most of these tests scan for mutations in just one of several relevant genes. Now, a new technique—called a multitarget assay panel—that screens four vulnerable genes for mutations is about to undergo a large-scale clinical trial. Moreover, this new test ...

Nearly six percent of all Americans, both men and women, will develop colon cancer in their lifetime. In the year 2000, cancers of the colon and rectum occurred in an estimated 130,200 persons and killed 28,500 women and 27,800 men in this country. Yet substantial progress has been made against these cancers. Routine screening has led to a decrease in both the occurrence and death rates, and genetic and epidemiological studies have increased medical researchers’ understanding of both inherited and non-inherited forms of colorectal cancers. Screening techniques such as flexible sigmoidoscopy and stool blood tests have enabled doctors to find cancer at its earliest, most treatable stages. When the cancer is "localized", meaning it is present only in the colon or rectum, the five-year survival rate is 90 percent. However, once the disease has ...

1 IN THIS ISSUE: s Medicinal Plant Research, p. 2 s Studies Need Participants, p. 3 s Mothers With Cancer , p. 2 s People on the Move,p.3 s Streaming Video Server, p. 3 s Calendar, p. 4 Thomas Boyer, M.D., Director of New Arizona Liver Institute Arizona Cancer Center Receives $17 Million Grant for Colon Cancer Prevention Research Arizona Cancer Center researchers have received more than $17 million — the largest single grant to the UA College of Medicine in the past five years — from the National Cancer Institute to support colon cancer preven- tion research. The grant will fund the work of a team of researchers from six major universities over the next five years. “This grant will support the efforts of a team of outstanding cancer researchers who have ...

Some fats may ward off colon cancer Diets enriched with any of several sphingolipids—arcane, ubiquitous fats (SN: 5/31/97, p. 342) — appear to offer potent protection against colon cancer , a pair of animal exp eriments now indicates. Though sphingolipids occur in many foods, the source in these studies was, ironically, “fat-free” skim milk. Colon cancers develop within crypts, normal pocketlike structures lining the large intestine. Although young cells in the lower half of crypts proliferate, their growth in a healthy animal stops as the maturing cells slowly migrate upward. When this proliferation is abnormally high and it continues even as the cells enter the upper crypt regions, cancer can develop. In their new experiments, Eva-Maria Schmelz and Alfred H. Merrill of Emory University in Atlanta fed sphingolipids to mice with this abnormality, called aberrant crypts. In one test, the researchers ...

Screening cuts colon cancer deaths People whose stools are tested regularly for traces of blood are less likely to die of colorec- tal cancer than those who don’t submit samples for testing, an 18-year Minnesota study finds. Starting in the late 1970s, researchers enrolled 46,551 healthy volunteers, age 50 to 80, into three roughly equal groups to evaluate such screening. One group submitted fecal sam- ples from three consecutive stools once a year, another group did so every other year, and the third control group submitted none. When a stool sample showed traces of blood, the volun- teer underwent a colonoscopy—in which a doctor visually checks the colon for precancerous lesions or tumors. Patients were then treated accordingly, says study coauthor John H. Bond, a gastroenterologist at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis and the Minneapolis Veterans Affairs Medical Center. Overall death rates among ...

Drug combination slows colon cancer Aspirin and other nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs can retard the development of col- orectal cancer . The medications appear to promote programmed cell death, a process that works against the runaway cell growth that is the hallmark of tumors. Two recent studies of patients have hinted that combining the drugs with cholesterol-lowering medication might enhance this effect. A study of rats now confirms that suggestion. Researchers exposed 48 rats to chemicals that cause precancerous growths, then they divided the animals into four equal groups. One group received sulindac, a drug similar to aspirin, and a second got lovastatin, a cholesterol- lowering drug. The third group was given both drugs, and the fourth received no medication. The sulindac group showed precancerous growth only 85 percent as extensive as in the rats with no medication, the lovastatin group 88 percent ...

Anti-inflammatory drugs such as aspirin and ibuprofen seem to prevent some cases of colon cancer by suppressing two enzymes that promote the manufacture of prostaglandins, hormonelike fatty acids, in the body. Too much prostaglandin promotes runaway cell growth by disrupting programmed cell death. An aspirin-a-day regimen that reins in prostaglandins can cut colon cancer risk in half. The two suppressed enzymes, COX-1 and COX-2, appear in colon tumors in rodents as well as humans. COX-2 seems to be the culprit behind excessive prostaglandin production, whereas COX-1 apparently doesn’t promote cancer . In fact, subduing COX-1 can cause side effects, including ulcers, intestinal bleeding, and, less often, kidney damage. Now, a study in rats shows that a recently developed anti-inflammatory drug, celecoxib, thwarts COX-2 but not COX-1, say scientists at the American Health Foundation, a nonprofit cancer research ...

Do suicidal cells prevent colon cancer ? Cancer may kill, but its deadliness depends upon the ability to keep alive the dividing cells that feed its malignant growth. It’s not surprising, then, that cancer cells often have mutations that prevent them from undergoing apoptosis, a form of cellular suicide. Beyond their role in sustaining tumors, mutations that hinder apoptosis may initiate certain cancers. A new report suggests that precancerous polyps form in the colon because defects in a gene called APC stop the cells that line the colon from dying when they should. “It’s the first link between APC and programmed cell death,” says Patrice J. Morin, an author of the report. Investigators discovered APC while studying familial adenomatous polyposis (FAP). People with this rare inherited disorder commonly have thousands of polyps lining their colon . Because the polyps frequently progress to cancer ...

Smoking and colon cancer Studies designed to find out whether smoking increases the incidence of colon cancer have yielded equivocal results, at best. Now, using the knowledge that mutations in the p53 gene result in almost 50 percent of all colon cancers, researchers may have untangled smoking’s role in certain types of these cancers. Mutations in p53 cause cells to produce copious amounts of the flawed protein for which the gene codes. Moreover, this protein can’t perform its normal functions. Andrew Freedman and his colleagues at the Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, N.Y., collected tissue sam- ples and smoking information from 163 people with colorectal cancer . The researchers then used antibodies against the mutant protein to identify which tumors resulted from mutations in p53. The 326 healthy people who served as controls provided information about their smok- ing. When the researchers ...

Color colon cancer away? Curcumin is the pigment that gives turmeric — and any food to which this fragrant spice is added — its bright, yellow-orange hue. A new study now suggests that curcumin may also sup- press the development of colon cancer . Regions in which turmeric dresses up much of the traditional cuisine — especially Asia, where it colors curries — tend to have a low incidence of colon cancer , notes nutritional bio- chemist Bandaru S. Reddy of the American Health Foundation in Valhalla, N.Y. But what really caught the attention of his research team was the herb’s medicinal reputation. “It’s been used since ancient times in India as a household remedy for the treatment of sprains and swellings,” notes Robert McCaleb, president of the Herb Research Foundation in Boulder, Colo. Because aspirin and many other nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) inhibit colon cancer in animals and some ...

FIGURE 5 Average Annual Age-Adjusted Incidence and Mortality Rates* by Sex and Race, Pennsylvania Residents, 1992-1996 There were 7,011 resident cases of colon cancer diagnosed in 1996. It was the third most common cancer site among both males and females, accounting for over 10 percent of all the new cancer cases recorded for 1996. The average annual age-adjusted incidence rate for colon cancer during the period of 1992-96 was over 38 percent higher among males than for females, but differences by race were not as evident. Annual age-adjusted incidence rates during the ten years from 1987 to 1996 showed decreases among whites of both sexes but no clear trend among black males and black females. During the period of 1992-96, over 77 percent of the colon cancer cases were dianosed among Pennsylvania residents 65 years of age or older. Males tended to have the highest average annual (1992-96) age-specific incidence ...

To Prevent and Cure Cancer T he Arizona Cancer Center’s Colon Cancer Program is dedicated to creating a clinical and basic research program that prevents colon cancer and cures patients with the disease. Colon cancer is a preventable and curable disease if diagnosed at an early stage. This year in the state of Arizona, colon cancer will be diagnosed in 2,000 people, and 900 will die from it. The Colon Cancer Program team, under the direction of David S. Alberts, M.D., is committed to stamping out this disease. One way this goal is being accomplished is through the team’s drug development efforts, which include developing specific targets for drug action, synthesizing novel molecules, screening for anticancer and preventive activities, completing toxicologic testing, and designing and performing early stage clinical trials ...

What is colon cancer ? It is the growth of harmful cells in the rectum or large intestine ( colon ). What is a polyp? ? A polyp is a bump on the lining of the colon or rectum ? Left in place, some polyps may become a larger lump or cancer ? Colon cancer almost always starts with a polyp ? Early removal of a polyp stops the cancer before it starts (for both men and women) What are the signs of colon cancer ? ? Early screening is very important. There are usually no symptoms at first ? The number of cases of colon cancer rises greatly from age 50 to 70 Later you may have: ? Bloody or black, tarry stools ? Cramps or a full feeling ? A change in bowel habits ? Weight loss for no reason ? ...

FORM 143913 (January 2005) MD, MH, PR, CW Colon Cancer Screening Why screen for colon cancer ? The colon , or large intestine, is the last portion of the gastrointestinal tract and ends with the rectum. Cancer of the colon is the second most frequent cause of death from cancer in the United States, resulting in about 57,000 deaths per year. The risk of colon cancer increases as people age – 90 percent of colon cancers occur in individuals over 50 years of age. Colon cancer is also more common in people with a family history of colon cancer , or a personal history of colon polyps or inflammatory bowel disease. Cigarette smoking and excessive alcohol consumption may also increase the risk of colon cancer . The good news is that early screening can lead to both prevention of and better cure rates for colon cancer . How can screening prevent colon cancer ? ...