A Laboratory of the Future Human Experience
The rapidly increasing magnitude of noncommunicable diseases is fueled by rising risk factors including tobacco use, unhealthy diet, and lack of physical activity.
Almost two-thirds of deaths in the world are caused by noncommunicable diseases such as cancer, diabetes and heart and lung disease which are rapidly increasing at a cost to the global economy of trillions of dollars, according to U.N. estimates and preliminary results of a new study.
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Dogs sniffed out bowel cancer in more than nine out of 10 cases.
A Labrador retriever has sniffed out bowel cancer in breath and stool samples during a study in Japan.
The research, in the journal Gut, showed the dog was able to identify early stages of the disease.
It has already been suggested that dogs can use their noses to detect skin, bladder, lung, ovarian and breast cancers.
Cancer Research UK said it would be extremely difficult to use dogs for routine cancer testing.
The biology of a tumour is thought to include a distinct smell and a series of studies have used dogs to try to detect it.
Continue reading… “Early Bowel Cancer Detected by Dogs in Japan”
Lung cancer and melanoma are among the hardest cancers to treat.
Using two opposite strategies, one focused and one broad, scientists say they have made progress in taming two of the most intractable types of cancer. The focused approach shrank tumors significantly in a majority of patients with advanced lung cancer marked by a specific genetic abnormality.
Continue reading… “Significant Advances in Two of the Hardest to Treat Cancers”
Gene linked to lung cancer in ‘never-smokers’
Scientists have discovered what they claim is a common gene that raises the risk of developing lung cancer in non-smokers, a breakthrough which may pave the way for new targeted therapies for patients.
Continue reading… “Scientists Discover Gene Linked to Lung Cancer in Non-Smokers”
Mathematicians in Manchester are hoping electric fish can give them clues to solving a fiendishly complex mathematical problem – which could in turn lead to better treatment for patients with lung problems.
Continue reading… “Electric Fish Could Spark Innovations In Healthcare”
Genetically engineered stem cells from bone marrow showed promise as a potential new way to deliver a cancer-killing protein to tumors, British researchers said.
Continue reading… “Genetically Engineered Stem Cells Target Cancer Cells”
Scientists who studied 683 lung cancer patients found that women tended to be younger than men when they developed the disease, despite, on average, smoking much less than men.
Continue reading… “Women More Vulnerable To Smoking-Induced Cancers Than Men”
Lung transplant offers hope of a longer life for patients with end-stage respiratory diseases such as emphysema and cystic fibrosis, with some surviving for years following surgery. But due to chronic shortages of viable organs for transplant, only about 25 percent of patients on waiting lists receive new lungs. However, a new out-of-body lung-repair technique developed at the Toronto General Hospital may dramatically increase the number of lungs that can be used in transplants and improve surgical outcome.
Continue reading… “Repairing Lungs Outside The Body”
Surprise!
Surgeons in Russia’s Urals Region were staggered to find a 5-centimeter high spruce growing inside a man’s lung.
The discovery was made while Artyom Sidorkin, 28, from the Urals city of Izhevsk, was undergoing surgery.
Sidorkin had complained of extreme pain in his chest and had been coughing up blood, doctors suspected cancer.
“I blinked three times and thought I was seeing things,” Izhevsk surgeon Vladimir Kamashev said.
Continue reading… “Russian Doctors Find Tree Growing in Man’s Lung”
Thanks to David Van Sickle, we’ll soon be able to track (and hopefully eliminate) recurring asthma attack outbreaks. Sickle, a scholar in the Department of Population Health Sciences at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, is working with students in the biomedical engineering program to create an asthma inhaler with a built-in GPS receiver.
Continue reading… “GPS Enabled Asthma Inhaler To Track Asthma Attacks”
Infants born at very low birth weights are at increased risk of lung ailments in the first 12 months of life, and a new study suggests that modifiable indoor respiratory triggers, namely exposure to cigarette smoke and pests in the home, may be at least partly to blame.
Continue reading… “Living with Smokers Hard On Tiny Babies”
Finding it hard to quit cigarettes? Fret not, for researchers are close to developing a pill which they claim could mitigate some of the negative health effects of smoking.
Continue reading… “A Pill To Curb Smoking Damage”
