Colorectal cancer
Calcium use may cut cancer risk in women
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Calcium consumption may reduce the risk of all cancers in women and the risk of cancers of the digestive tract in women and men, according to a report in the Archives of Internal Medicine.
“Our study is one of the first cohort studies to examine dairy food and calcium intakes in relation to total cancer as well as (uncommon) cancers,” Dr. Yikyung Park, from the National Cancer Institute, Bethesda, Maryland, and colleagues note.
Using data from the National Institutes of Health-American Association of Retired Persons Diet and Health Study, the researchers assessed the impact of dairy food and calcium intake on the risk of cancer in 293,907 men and 198,903 women.
Newly identified gene powerful predictor of colon cancer metastasis
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Cancer Researchers at the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine (MDC) Berlin-Buch and the Charité – Universitäts Medizin Berlin (Germany) have identified a gene which enables them to predict for the first time with high probability if colon cancer is going to metastasize. Assistant Professor Dr. Ulrike Stein, Professor Peter M. Schlag, and Professor Walter Birchmeier were able to demonstrate that the gene MACC1 (Metastasis-Associated in Colon Cancer 1) not only promotes tumor growth but also the development of metastasis.When MACC1 gene activity is low, the life expectancy of patients with colon cancer is longer in comparison to patients with high MACC1 levels. (Nature Medicine, doi: 10.1038/nm.1889)*.
According to the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, USA, more than 108,000 people developed colon cancer in the US in 2008. Despite surgery, chemo- and radiotherapy, only 50 percent of patients can be cured because 20 percent of the patients have already developed metastasis by the time their colon cancer is diagnosed. In addition, one-third of patients whose treatment of the original colon cancer was successful will, nevertheless, go on to develop metastasis.
The MDC and Charité researchers are convinced that the identification of the MACC1 gene will aid medical doctors in identifying those patients as early as possible who are at high risk of developing life-threatening metastasis in the liver and the lungs. As a result, more intensive treatment and follow-up care could be offered to high risk patients.
U.S. blacks lag whites in colorectal cancer progress
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Colorectal cancer diagnoses and deaths have fallen in the United States this decade, but the gap in progress between whites and blacks is widening, the American Cancer Society said on Monday.
Improvement has come about chiefly due to prevention and early detection through colonoscopy and other screening methods recommended starting at age 50, the group said in a report.
Colorectal cancer, which includes cancer of the colon and rectum, ranks third among all types of cancer in the United States both in the number of people who get it and in the number who die, but rates have been falling since the 1980s.
Vitamin D helps colorectal cancer patients: study
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Vitamin D may extend the lives of people with colon and rectal cancer, according to a study published on Wednesday, suggesting another health benefit from the so-called sunshine vitamin.
Previous research has indicated that people with higher levels of vitamin D may be less likely to develop colon and rectal cancer, also called colorectal cancer.
The new study led by Dr. Kimmie Ng of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston involved 304 men and women diagnosed with colorectal cancer from 1991 to 2002, to see if higher levels of vitamin D in the patients affected their survival chances.
Mayo-led study finds smoking related to subset of colorectal cancers
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Smoking puts older women at significant risk for loss of DNA repair proteins that are critical for defending against development of some colorectal cancers, according to research from a team led by Mayo Clinic scientists.
In a study being presented at the annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), the researchers found that women who smoked were at increased risk for developing colorectal tumors that lacked some or all of four proteins, known as DNA mismatch repair (MMR) proteins. These proteins keep cells lining the colon and rectum healthy because they recognize and repair genetic damage as well as mistakes that occur during cell division.
Researchers believe that, in this study population, few if any of the four proteins were absent because of an inherited genetic alteration. “We think that smoking induces a condition within intestinal cells that does not allow MMR genes to express their associated proteins, and this loss leads to formation of tumors in some women,” says the study’s lead author, Mayo gastroenterologist Paul Limburg, M.D.
