Laser eye surgery has no long-term effects on cornea

A research team, including an Indian-origin boffin, has found that laser eye surgery that corrects vision does not lead to later problems with the cornea – at least not after nine years .

Two types of laser surgery—photorefractive keratectomy (PRK) and laser in situ keratomileusis (LASIK)—are often used to correct refractive errors such as nearsightedness.

However, little is known about how these procedures affect the cornea, the transparent membrane covering the eye, on the cellular level over the long term.

Sanjay V. Patel, M.D., and William M. Bourne, M.D., of Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn., studied 29 eyes of 16 patients who had undergone LASIK or PRK. Photographs of the cells lining the cornea (endothelial cells) were taken and analysed before and nine years after surgery.

The annual rate of corneal endothelial cell loss in the eyes of patients who had had surgery was compared with those of 42 eyes that had not undergone either procedure.

Nine years after surgery, the density of cells lining the cornea had decreased by 5.3 percent from their preoperative state.However, the average annual rate of cell loss (0.6 percent) was the same in corneas of eyes that were operated on and those that were not.

"Our results support the findings of numerous short-term studies that found no significant endothelial cell loss after LASIK and PRK," the authors said. They added: "The importance of the findings in our study relates to using corneas that have undergone LASIK or PRK as donor tissue.”

The study has been reported in the November issue of Archives of Ophthalmology , one of the JAMA/Archives journals.

Source:http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com

Deadliest lung cancer breakthrough

British researchers have found that a drug destroys tumours in a form of inoperable lung cancer that kills more than nine out of 10 sufferers. The treatment works by blocking the growth of the cancer cells and eventually causing them to self destruct. In more than 50 per cent of the trials, the treatment, which appears to have no side affects, killed all traces of the disease.

"We are very excited about it," said Professor Michael Seckl, the molecular oncologist who led the study at Imperial College London, "If you get diagnosed with this cancer your chances of surviving are very small. Over the last 30 years we have made very little progress in its treatment. This is why this is so exciting. It is pretty unusual to see a drug that makes these tumours completely disappear."

More than 34,000 people die each year from lung cancer in the United Kingdom, the heaviest death toll of any cancer.

One in five lung cancer sufferers have a particularly virulent strain called small cell lung cancer which kills all but three per cent of sufferers within five years of diagnoses. With this form of lung cancer, tumours spread quickly so it is rarely possible to remove the tumours surgically. Because of this, small cell lung cancer is treated with chemotherapy.

Initially, the treatment often appears to work, reducing the size of the tumours. However, the tumours usually grow back rapidly and then become resistant to further treatment.

The researchers behind the new study published in the journal Cancer Research have identified a drug that, in half of the mice treated, was able to completely shrink tumours away.

It was also able to stop tumours from growing back and it helped other forms of chemotherapy to work more effectively.

If the drug proves successful in humans, the researchers hope that it could help patients with this kind of lung cancer to live longer with five to 10 years.

Prof Seckl said: "I have been working on small cell lung cancer for many years and to find something that can take a measurable piece of tumour and make it go away is wonderful. Lung cancer is the most common cancer killer in the world and over 100 people in the UK are diagnosed with the disease every day. Although it responds to chemotherapy initially, the tumours soon become resistant to treatment and sadly nearly all people with the disease do not survive."

Dr Joanna Owens, Cancer Research UK's science information manager, said: "It's encouraging to see potential new drugs for lung cancer in the initial stages of development. The early results from this study are impressive but we'll need to wait for the results of clinical trials before we'll know if the drugs could work for patients."

Source:www.telegraph.co.uk

Scientists Develop Premier Atlas of Bacterial Diversity Across Human Body

The first atlas of bacterial diversity across the human body, describing the several activities of microbes, has been developed at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

The atlas charts wide variations in microbe populations that live in different regions of the human body and which aid us in physiological functions that contribute to our health.

Rob Knight, senior author on the study, said that their research showed humans carry "personalized" communities of bacteria around that vary widely from our foreheads and feet to our noses and navels.

The researchers found unexpectedly wide variability in bacterial communities from person to person in the study, which included nine healthy volunteers and which targeted 27 specific sites on the body.

"This is the most complete view we have yet of the microbial side of ourselves, one that our group and others will be adding to over the coming years. The goal is to find out what is normal for a healthy person, which will provide a baseline for further studies to look at people with diseased states. One of the biggest surprises was how much variation there was from person to person in a healthy group of subjects," said Knight.

There are an estimated 100 trillion microbes residing on and within each human being that are thought to collectively endow us with the essential traits we rely on for a variety of functions, including the proper development of our immune systems, efficient digestion of key foods and resistance to invasion by lurking microbial pathogens.

Source:www.medindia.com

Younger women prone to breast cancer

Amit Bhargav, consultant oncologist at the Max Healthcare hospital in the capital, said that in his career, the age group vulnerable to breast cancer has dropped drastically.

"When I started practicing oncology about 15 years back, women mostly in the age group of 50-55 were most vulnerable to breast cancer. But these days the incidence of the disease has become common amongst women aged between 35-45," Bhargav told IANS.

Saturday was observed as Breast Cancer awareness day and doctors like Bhargav said that they are doing their bit to spread as much awareness on the disease so that early detection was possible and improve chances of recovery.

"Breast cancer is mostly an urban disease. The maximum incidence of the disease is seen in metropolitan cities where life is fast. Most girls work, have late marriages and then have children even later. All these factors work at increasing the chances of breast cancer," Bhargav said.

Harish Chaturvedi, a cancer expert, added: "High pollution level in cities also contribute to higher chances of breast cancer. Smokers and those who consume alcohol are also a high risk group. Junk food is also a threat."

Stress and obesity are other factors that can increase the chances of having breast cancer.

While genetics - if a woman below 45 years of age has breast cancer, her daughter's chances for the same rise - puts women in the high risk group, those who have had an early menarchy or have attained menopause are also a vulnerable group.

According to B.Niranjan Naik of Dharamshila hospital, a cancer speciality hospital, almost 75,000 new cases of breast cancer are detected in India every year.

"20-25 percent of cancer cases in Indian women is that of breast cancer. The main symptoms which one should look out for are a lump in the breast, discharge from the nipples, skin retraction or thickening, ulceration and skin irritation.

"Early detection is the key to avoid breast cancer. Women in the high risk group must go for breast screening tests when they touch 30," Naik said.

Bhargav added: "Although there is no study done, an estimated 50,000-70,000 women die every year due to breast cancer in India".

Source:http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com

Circumcision can reduce AIDS risk

Austrian researchers analyzing biopsies from 20 circumcised and uncircumcised men found that the inner foreskin of the penis contains a higher concentration of Langerhans cells – a prime target of the human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV – than any other part of the male foreskin. Because this would make the inner foreskin more susceptible to HIV, removing it through circumcision would help lower a man's risk of contracting HIV, they concluded.

In the second study, a two-year study of nearly 3,000 Kenyan men found that those who were recently circumcised were less likely to suffer coital injuries, such as scratches, cuts, scrapes or soreness, than those who had their foreskin intact. Sexual function was determined to be similar between the circumcised and uncircumcised groups, according to the research team, which was from the United States, Canada and Africa.

"These are important reports which support the concepts that circumcision does not interfere with sexual function and it is an important element of HIV prevention in sub-Saharan Africa," association spokesman Dr. Ira D. Sharlip said in a news release issued by the organization.

"At the same time, it should be emphasized that circumcision must be combined with other techniques of HIV prevention, such as safe sex and voluntary testing," he said. "It is not sufficient to rely on circumcision alone to prevent HIV transmission."

Source:http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com

Blood vessels could predict how prostate cancer would behave

Blood vessels in prostate cancer could act as predictor of how it would behave, say researchers at The Ohio State University and the Harvard School of Public Health.

The study of 572 men with localized prostate cancer indicates that aggressive or lethal prostate cancers tend to have blood vessels that are small, irregular and primitive in cross-section. On the other hand, slow-growing or indolent tumours have blood vessels that look more normal.

“It’s as if aggressive prostate cancers are growing faster and their blood vessels never fully mature,” said study leader Dr. Steven Clinton. “Prostate cancer is very heterogeneous, and we need better tools to predict whether a patient has a prostate cancer that is aggressive, fairly average or indolent in its behavior so that we can better define a course of treatment – surgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy, hormonal therapy, or potentially new drugs that target blood vessels – that is specific for each person’s type of cancer. Similarly, if we can better determine at the time of biopsy or prostatectomy who is going to relapse, we can start treatment earlier, when the chance for a cure may be better,” added Clinton.

The study analyzed tumor samples and clinical outcome data from men participating in the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study, which involves 51,529 male North American dentists, optometrists, podiatrists, pharmacists and veterinarians.

After an average follow-up of 10 years, 44 of the 572 men had developed metastatic cancer or died of their cancer.

Men whose tumours had smaller vessel diameters were six times more likely to have aggressive tumours and die of their disease, and those with the most irregularly shaped vessels were 17 times more likely to develop lethal prostate cancer.

The findings were published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

Source:www.newspostonline.com

Exercise Cuts Prostate Cancer Risk

A new study suggests that men who get moderate amounts of exercise regularly may reduce their risk of prostate cancer, including the type consisting of aggressive, fast-growing tumors.

The study, published in the November 2009 issue of Journal of Urology, showed prostate cancer was less likely to be diagnosed in men who got exercise regularly than those who led a sedentary lifestyle.

Dr. Stephen J. Freedland and a team of his colleagues of the Duke University Prostate Center and the VA Medical Center in Durham, North Carolina analyzed data from 190 men who underwent biopsies for suspected prostate cancer and found the association.

They found that those patients who exercised moderately, or those who engaged in three to six hours of walking each week, were two-thirds less likely to be diagnosed with prostate cancer than their sedentary counterparts. Of 111 men who followed a sedentary lifestyle in the study, about 50 percent were diagnosed with the disease compared to 27 percent of those who exercised to a degree equivalent to three to six hours of walking each week.

The researchers also found that men who got the amount of exercise equivalent to one to three hours of walking each week were 86 percent less likely to develop an aggressive form of the cancer.

Of the men diagnosed with prostate cancer, aggressive cancer was found in 51 percent of those who lived a sedentary life and only 22 percent in those who were physically active - getting the equivalent of one to three hours of walking every week.

The study found an association between exercise and reduced risk of prostate cancer. But the results do not prove that exercise is the cause for the reduction in the male reproductive cancer; however, the possibility cannot be excluded either. Exercise or being physically active has been linked to a reduced risk of cancer in general, not just prostate cancer. One possibility is that those who exercise may follow a healthy lifestyle including a healthy diet.

However, exercise by itself may potentially have a protective effect against prostate cancer and possibly other types of cancer as well.

To say the least, it has been known that exercise lowers blood levels of sexual hormones like testosterone and others that are known to promote prostate cancer growth. Exercise can also boost immunity and the body's anti-oxidation mechanisms, which may help reduce odds for men to acquire prostate cancer.

A recent study published on Oct 27, 2009 in the online British Journal of Cancer, also suggests that being physically active may help reduce risk of prostate cancer.

Source:www.foodconsumer.com