Category: Cancer

Impact Lab > Cancer
Cancer, Healthcare, Medical Breakthrough

Researchers successfully turn breast cancer cells into fat to stop them from spreading

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Researchers have been able to coax human breast cancer cells to turn into fat cells in a new proof-of-concept study in mice.

To achieve this feat, the team exploited a weird pathway that metastasising cancer cells have; their results are just a first step, but it’s a truly promising approach.

When you cut your finger, or when a foetus grows organs, the epithelium cells begin to look less like themselves, and more ‘fluid’ – changing into a type of stem cell called a mesenchyme and then reforming into whatever cells the body needs.

This process is called epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) and it’s been known for a while that cancer can use both this one and the opposite pathway called MET (mesenchymal‐to‐epithelial transition), to spread throughout the body and metastasise.

Continue reading… “Researchers successfully turn breast cancer cells into fat to stop them from spreading”

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Cancer, Healthcare, Medical Breakthrough, Medicine

Lasers cure nearly 50% of patients with prostate cancer in new study

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Experts have honed a cutting-edge method to kill off tumors with less damage to healthy cells.

Researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel and STEBA Biotech have announced the success of the unique method they developed to fight prostate cancer. This treatment, which the group of expects called “transformative,” has shown promising results.

Under development since 2011, vascular targeted photodynamic therapy (VPT), as the procedure is called, is carried out in a two-step process. Patients are first introduced to WST11 — a compound extracted from some benthic bacteria, or bacteria that dwell at the bottom of the sea. These bacteria are particularly special, though, as they are highly light-sensitive.

Optical fibers are then inserted through an area called the perineum, found between the the testes and the anus, and directly into the prostate gland. Afterwards, the scientists turn on a red laser that is induced through the optical fibers. This process utilizes the photosensitivity of the WST11 drug and activates it. Upon activation, free radicals are released within the area, attacking and destroying the tumors. Unlike conventional treatments which might affect a general area of body cells, this treatment is localized. The nearby cells are left more or less unharmed.

Continue reading… “Lasers cure nearly 50% of patients with prostate cancer in new study”

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Cancer, DNA, Healthcare, Medical Breakthrough

Scientists develop 10-minute universal cancer test

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Coloured scanning electron micrograph of dividing breast cancer cells.

Inexpensive procedure shows whether patient has cancerous cells in the body, but does not reveal where or how serious it is.

Scientists have developed a universal cancer test that can detect traces of the disease in a patient’s bloodstream.

The cheap and simple test uses a colour-changing fluid to reveal the presence of malignant cells anywhere in the body and provides results in less than 10 minutes.

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Cancer, Healthcare, Medical Breakthrough

The end of chemotherapy? Scientists discover all cancerous cells have a KILL CODE that can be triggered without the gruelling treatment

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Researchers at Northwestern University found that our cells can kill themselves

Currently, this is triggered by disease itself or the artificial use of chemotherapy

Now, experts believe the ‘kill codes’ could be synthetically duplicated for use

Every cell in the human body contains a ‘kill code’ which can be triggered to cause its own self-destruction.

That’s the discovery made by researchers at Northwestern University, Illinois, who believe it could be utilised for the future fight against cancer.

Continue reading… “The end of chemotherapy? Scientists discover all cancerous cells have a KILL CODE that can be triggered without the gruelling treatment”

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Big Problems, Cancer, Corporate Manipulation, Healthcare, Science & Technology News

Why haven’t we cured cancer? American Cancer Society – world’s wealthiest “non-profit “

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Have you ever wondered where all the money goes that you donate to the American Cancer Society ?With the advancement of medicine, you’d think scientists would have unlocked the cure by now with the ACS’s help. Right?.

Is there more to this story than meets the eye?Apparently, the American Cancer Society seems to like the status quo. People with cancer are unnecessarily dying, when a cure is probably within reach of American scientists.

There’s a lot of money to be made by chemotherapy and other primitive treatments especially for the board members and their companies that sit on the ACS board.

“The American Cancer Society is fixated on damage control— diagnosis and treatment— and basic molecular biology, with indifference or even hostility to cancer prevention.

This myopic mindset is compounded by interlocking conflicts of interest with the cancer drug, mammography, and other industries.

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Biotech, Cancer, Medical Breakthrough, Medicine, Science & Technology News

Scientists just found a novel, cheap way to use CRISPR gene editing to fight cancer

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Immunotherapy Holds Big Promise for Beating Cancer

CRISPR is by all accounts a fascinating technology. Its headline feature is that it can literally be used to slice, dice, and otherwise manipulate the body’s genetic code—functions that could carry staggering implications for treating everything from inherited disorders to cancer to HIV/AIDS one day.

Now, new (though extremely early) research suggests that CRISPR could be used to vastly improve upon a new form of cancer-fighting methods that turn the body’s own immune T cells into specially targeted killers that attack cancerous tissue.

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Analysis, Aviation, Cancer

Flight attendants have higher rates of many cancers, study says

Flight attendants are exposed to a number of known cancer-causing risks, but few studies have rigorously quantified that risk, and researchers say they are an understudied occupational group.

The Harvard Flight Attendant Health Study (FAHS), begun in 2007, addresses some of the gaps in understanding health risks among flight attendants. In the latest report, published in the journal Environmental Health, researchers found that flight attendants had higher rates of many cancers, including breast cancer and melanoma, compared to the general population.

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Cancer, China, Medical Breakthrough

A cancer blockbuster gets approved in China. Will the floodgates now open?

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Bristol-Myers Squibb announced today that its pioneering cancer immunotherapy drug Opdivo has been approved for sale in China.

Opdivo targets a protein called PD-1, which is effectively a braking signal in the immune system. Cancer cells are incredibly wily when it comes to evading the body’s own natural defenses, and one of the ways they manage this feat is by tricking the immune system into restraining its own attack dogs. So-called “checkpoint inhibitors” like Opdivo—which is often called by its biological name, nivolumab—essentially remove the biological leash, allowing immune cells to freely attack the cancer predator.

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Cancer, Healthcare, Medical Breakthrough, new technology

Magnetic ‘metal seed’ that destroys brain tumours in ten minutes invented by British scientists

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Deadly brain tumours could be heated up by MRI scanners until they die in groundbreaking treatment

Deadly brain tumours could be removed in just ten minutes with a groundbreaking new treatment which uses MRI scanners to heat up cancer cells until they die.

The new therapy, developed by University College London, involves injecting a tiny magnetic metal ‘seed’ into the bloodstream and directing it to the site of the cancer.

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Analysis, Cancer, Healthcare, Medicine

Same cancer, worse results and twice the cost in the US

Monthly spending on certain cancer patients in Washington was $12,345 vs. $6,195 in British Columbia

Despite paying double, Americans died slightly faster than Canadians in the study

(CNN)Americans paid twice as much as Canadians for health care, but they didn’t get twice the benefit, according to a new study of patients with advanced colorectal cancer who lived, in some cases, mere miles from each other.

Continue reading… “Same cancer, worse results and twice the cost in the US”

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