Hope or: Cancer Sucks

Again and again, I have been touched by the smallest kind gestures - a squeeze of my hand, a gentle touch, a reassuring word. In some ways, these quiet acts of humanity have felt more healing than the high-dose radiation and chemotherapy that hold the hope of a cure.- Kenneth B. Schwartz

I went to a Schwartz Center Rounds last week and the topic was Hope, it was very lovely and empowering, but to me it lacked that kick-ass spunky attitude I crave.  

Schwartz Rounds are open to all hospital staff (try to sneak in and sit in the back)  sites include:

Current Rounds Sites

California
Scripps Mercy Hospital, San Diego
University of Southern California, Norris Cancer Center, Los Angeles

Colorado
Longmont United Hospital, Longmont

Connecticut
Lawrence & Memorial Hospital, New London
MidState Medical Center, Meriden
St. Francis Hospital & Medical Center, Hartford
Yale Cancer Center, New Haven

Delaware
Christiana Care Health System, Newark

Florida
Florida Hospital Cancer Institute, Altamonte
Florida Hospital Cancer Institute, Orlando
M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, Orlando
Mayo Clinic, Jacksonville
Moffitt Cancer Center, Tampa
Mt. Sinai Cancer Center, Miami Beach

Idaho
Saint Alphonsus Regional Medical Center, Boise
St. Luke’s Mountain States Tumor Institute, Boise

Illinois
Comer Children's Hospital, Chicago
Evanston Northwestern Healthcare, Evanston
Northwestern Memorial Hospital, Chicago
University of Chicago Hospitals, Chicago

Indiana
Indiana University Cancer Center, Indianapolis

Louisiana
Tulane University Health Sciences Center, New Orleans

Maine
Maine Medical Center, Portland

Maryland
Johns Hopkins – Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center, Baltimore
Western Maryland Hospital Center, Hagerstown

Massachusetts
Baystate Medical Center, Springfield
Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston
Boston Home, Dorchester
Boston Medical Center, Boston
Bowdoin Street Community Health Center, Dorchester
Brigham & Women’s Hospital, Boston
Caritas Good Samaritan Medical Center, Brockton
Caritas Norwood Hospital, Norwood
Carney Hospital, Dorchester
Children’s Hospital, Boston
Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston
Emerson Hospital, Concord
Falmouth Hospital, Falmouth
Faulkner Hospital, Jamaica Plain
Hancock Manor Nursing Home, Dorchester
Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates, Watertown
Health Alliance Hospital Hospitals, Fitchburg
Hebrew Rehabilitation Center for the Aged, Boston
Heywood Hospital, Gardner
Joseph M. Smith Community Health Center, Allston
Lahey Clinic, Burlington
Life Care Center of Nashoba Valley, Littleton
Martha's Vineyard Hospital, Oak Bluffs
Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston
MetroWest Medical Center, Framingham
Mount Auburn Hospital, Cambridge
NE Sinai Hospital & Rehabilitation Center, Stoughton
Newton-Wellesley Hospital, Newton
North Adams Hospital, North Adams
North Shore Medical Center, Salem
Rehabilitation Hospital of Cape Cod & the Islands, Sandwich
Saint Anne’s Hospital, Fall River
Saint Vincent Hospital, Worcester
South Shore Hospital, South Weymouth
Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital, Boston
Tufts-New England Medical Center, Boston
UMass Memorial Healthcare, Worcester
VA Boston Healthcare System, Brockton
VA Boston Healthcare System, West Roxbury
Winchester Hospital, Winchester
Youville Hospital, Cambridge

Michigan
Henry Ford Hospital, Detroit
Ingham Regional Medical Center, Lansing
MidMichigan Medical Center, Midland
Providence Cancer Institute, Southfield
Saint Mary’s Health Care, Grand Rapids
University of Michigan Medical Center, Ann Arbor
William Beaumont Hospital, Royal Oak
West Michigan Cancer Center, Kalamazoo

Missouri
St. Luke’s Cancer Institute, Kansas City

Nebraska
University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha

New Hampshire
Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center, Hanover
Exeter Hospital, Exeter
Frisbie Hospital, Rochester
Wentworth-Douglass Hospital, Dover

New Jersey
Ocean Medical Center, Brick
Overlook Hospital, Summit
Valley Hospital, Ridgewood
Virtua Health-Memorial Hospital, Mount Holly

New York
Mount Sinai Hospital, New York City
Roswell Park Cancer Institute, Buffalo
University of Rochester Medical Center, Rochester
VA New York Harbor Healthcare, Brooklyn
VA Western New York Healthcare System, Buffalo

North Carolina
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Pennsylvania
Lehigh Valley Hospital, Allentown
University of Pennsylvania Medical Center/Presbyterian Hospital, Philadelphia

Rhode Island
Miriam Hospital, Providence
Rhode Island Hospital, Providence

Tennessee
East Tennessee State University, Johnson City
Saint Thomas Hospital, Nashville
Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville

Texas
M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston

Vermont
Fletcher Allen Health Care, Burlington

Virginia
Vinson Hall Corporation, McLean

Wisconsin
Froedtert Memorial Lutheran Hospital, Milwaukee

Clinical trials involving humans, that's right... experiments on YOU.



You may be asked by your doctor, or nurse, if you would be interested in participating in a "Clinical Trial". Why? Usually because the medical community wants to know if they are doing everything they can to give you the best possible treatment for you. That's easy. But what if the best treatment is a "maybe it will work" or "it works in the test tube!"



I have been involved in three clinical trials in my life.

1. When I was in college I volunteered to help test the reliability of polygraph machines. I was wired up strapped in and then experimented on. I remember signing something, I didn't read it beforehand though. (I have NO faith in the ability of a polygraph machine to accurately predict truthfulness in humans... none).

2. I volunteered to try an experimental nasal-pathway anti cancer drug, to test for efficacy (does it work well enough to change the way things are currently administered). I remember looking at the consent and knowing what it was. The doctor explained it so well that I didn't really read it when I took it home that night; the next day I said I did read it though...

3.  I volunteered to be measured all over and followed for a long time to see if my body changed in predictable ways. I was working in the field by then so I couldn't WAIT to read the consent and compare and contrast what what written with what the doctor had said, with their language compared to the language we use in our consents, it was great fun! (didn't meet the eligibility requirements for that study though)


Like every other "after the fact" guy, I want folks to pay more attention than I did.

How many NCI trials are listed in Physician Data Query (PDQ®) database for the four major types of cancer?

• 133 for lung cancer (including 95 for non-small cell lung cancer, 33 for small cell lung cancer, and 3 for pulmonary carcinoid tumors),
• 192 for breast cancer (including 152 for female breast cancer and 40 for male breast cancer),
• 90 for prostate cancer
• 57 for colon cancer.

Where do I go for information?

NCI-designated Comprehensive Cancer Centers

Clinical Trials Cooperative Groups

American College of Radiology Imaging Network Bruce J. Hillman, M.D., Chair Suite 1600 1818 Market Street Philadelphia, PA 19103 http://www.acrin.org American College of Surgeons Oncology Group Heidi Nelson, M.D., Co-Chair David M. Ota, M.D., Co-Chair 2400 Pratt Street Durham, NC 27705 http://www.acosog.org Cancer and Leukemia Group B Richard L. Schilsky, M.D., Chair Suite 2050 230 West Monroe Street Chicago, IL 60606 http://www.calgb.org Children’s Oncology Group Gregory H. Reaman, M.D., Chair 440 East Huntington Drive Post Office Box 60012 Arcadia, CA 91066–6012 http://www.childrensoncologygroup.org Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group Robert L. Comis, M.D., Chair Suite 1100 1818 Market Street Philadelphia, PA 19103 http://www.ecog.org European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer Françoise Meunier, M.D., Director General Avenue E. Mounier 83, BTE 11 B–1200 Brussels Belgium http://www.eortc.be/default.htm

Gynecologic Oncology Group Philip J. DiSaia, M.D., Chair Suite 1020 Four Penn Center 1600 John F. Kennedy Boulevard Philadelphia, PA 19103 http://www.gog.org National Cancer Institute of Canada, Clinical Trials Group Joseph L. Pater, M.D., Director Queen’s University 10 Stuart Street Kingston , Ontario K7L 3N6 Canada http://www.ctg.queensu.ca National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Project Norman Wolmark, M.D., Chair Fifth Floor East Commons Professional Building Four Allegheny Center Pittsburgh, PA 15212–5234 http://www.nsabp.pitt.edu North Central Cancer Treatment Group Jan C. Buckner, M.D., Chair 200 First Street, SW. Rochester, MN 55905 http://ncctg.mayo.edu Radiation Therapy Oncology Group Walter J. Curran, Jr., M.D., Chair Suite 1600 1818 Market Street Philadelphia, PA 19103 http://www.rtog.org Southwest Oncology Group Laurence H. Baker, D.O., Chair 24 Frank Lloyd Wright Drive Post Office Box 483 Ann Arbor, MI 48106 http://www.swog.org

Paul Levy has this to say: http://runningahospital.blogspot.com/2007/01/infectious-behavior.html

"Wash your hands, and the rest will follow..." I always say, but I'm a little guy. This is a big guy, in a big hospital. And he came out SWINGING! There are infections in every medical environment out there. Like schools,however, how hospitals deal with the problem is like how parents decide where the little tykes get enrolled.


This ship is larger than any single hospital; even the biggest. It is all about how WE act when we're in a hospital. And when I say we I mean WE!  That means every single man, women and child out there. Kids swap cold germs every time they swap toys in school. That doesn't mean you don't TRY to make them wash their hands, and you TRY to have environments where wiping things down are a part of how you act. I wasn't going to a gym for very long before a understood that wearing shower-slippers is good for everyone. I wouldn't THINK of going to a salad bar with out a sneeze guard, and I treat my work environment with a healthy caution.

We need to shake hands when we meet people, it's a part of being human. But I feel just as comfortable saying "I'm getting over something right now", when I'm not sure if I'm still contagious after a cold.

We need to touch doorknobs, elevator buttons and hand rails, so I try to minimize how often I touch my face.


If I'm going INTO a treatment area, I wash my hands and try to be respectful of people's personal space. I work in oncology and some of these folks don't need any more germs coming at them.

Came upon this in my reading. First, as always, who can read this stuff! Second, PIRATES!

"In addition, HHV-8 has a number of genes such as ORF K12 (encodes the highly expressed transcript, kaposin), and ORF K1, a transmembrane protein that interacts with immunoreceptor kinases, which are likely to play a role in tumorigenesis. Functional studies suggest that these pirated genes may help the virus to evade immune responses, prevent cell cycle shutdown and interrupt activation of apoptotic pathways. This strategy has been referred to as "molecular piracy" of host cell genes. Like many complex DNA viruses, HHV-8 encodes a number of immunomodulatory factors:

Fas signalling in (virus-infected) target cells is triggered by Fas receptor multimerization on binding with membrane-bound Fas-L. Subsequent recruitment of the adaptor molecule Fas-activated death domain (FADD) leads to upstream caspase (caspase 8) autoactivation and release, leading to downstream effector capsase activation (caspase-3, -6, -7) & apoptosis. Death-receptor triggered apoptosis can be inhibited at several points: at the initiator stage by FLIP or in the amplification loop by bcl-2. HHV-8 v-FLIP block apoptosis in virus-infected cells. In addition, the vius also encodes a decoy (non-signalling) Fas receptor. (Rezaee SA, et al. Kaposi's sarcoma-associated herpesvirus immune modulation: an overview. J Gen Virol. 2006 87: 1781)

Plus, Pirates just kind of... GO with oncology
http://haikuoftheid.blogspot.com/2005/12/pirates-arrrrrgh.html

Dr. Henry Koon has a lot to say about AIDS related Kaposi's Sarcoma, Chronic Myeloid Leukemia (CML) and Gastrointestinal Stromal Tumors (GIST) and about Cancer  - In General.

Cancer was presumed to be  "of  a kind" like Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey" Big Black Monolith. All the same, impenetrable and unknowable... with dire consequences for mankind.


Along comes a clinical trial that says "Hey, This type of Cancer, and only this type, needs an exact thingy to grow. Lets make sure it doesn't get any of that thingy and see what happens. Viola! Cancer dies. What does this mean? Well, not only are cancers different because:
1. You can catch them (HPV) or you can't (Pancreatic)
2. You can increase your odds through contact (Asbestosis) or behavior (smoking)
3. You can be genetically vulnerable (Colorectal) or not (Melanoma)
But you can be everything or nothing all at once! (Breast)

Old timey oncologists:


New timey oncologists:


This means we may not rid the world of cancer in YOUR lifetime, but we are going to whittle away at the monolith by helping people identify which behaviors to avoid (unprotected sun exposure) and which behaviors to do (EAT RIGHT!!!!!!); what cancers we are likely to get (genetic testing). And which TYPE of cancer we have, to tailor our chemo, like our clothes, just for us.  Like Time Magazine said, this time it's all about YOU!

"Health physicists are establishing safe procedures for a promising experimental brain-cancer therapy which uses a radioactive version of a protein found in scorpion venom. For many, this will conjure images of Spiderman's nemesis, the Scorpion. The purpose of this work is not science fiction, but rather to help to develop a promising new therapy for brain cancer. The venom of the yellow Israeli scorpion preferentially attaches to the cells of a type of essentially incurable brain cancers known as gliomas."







Radioactive Scorpion Venom as a treatment for brain cancer! Apparently, making it radioactive gives it the punch - but the question is... why is scorpion venom attracted to cancer cells? Is this a first time case of two wrongs making a right? 

And another question... who thought this up? What is the conversation around that water-cooler like?

Joe Scientist/Physicist: Yeah, vacation was a hoot. Mary and the kids went hiking but I stayed in the tent to nap. I got bit by a horribly ugly little desert critter and after nearly dying I only ended up with a headache! Thank god I never go anywhere without my pocket-lab. That anti-venom I made only took seven minutes, I had THREE whole minutes to spare. Science rules!

Jill Scientist/Physicist: A headache you say? Hummmmm... I wonder if that's the T-cell Tram-34 carrier we've been looking for. Quick! Someone get me some venom and radiate it, before I forget to write this down.

It could happen, Scientist/Physicists are capable of saying just about anything and making it appear normal.



These are seriously smart folks, just the sort we want  theorizing about venom and it's possible uses to improve mankind.
They are the MacGyvers of the medical world. They just know how to do things.

Look!
Down on your plate of food!
Able to stop mutation with a single bound!
Able to fly at the source of Cancer DNA!
It's Super Vitamin B - FOLATE!



Dietary Supplement Fact Sheet: Folate   Yes FOLATE (One of the B vitamin complexes) It's in the food we should be eating anyway, and the good news just keeps piling up! I was thinking about diet the other day. I sat down to a dinner of corn, just corn, and thought back to being a child and imagining what it would be like to make dinner for myself! Cakes and cookies, ice cream, goodies, olives (weird, I know, but my niece liked them as a toddler too... so it must be genetic) I never once pictured myself sitting down to a meal I had chosen for myself, that even INCLUDED veggies, let alone consisting of ONLY veggies! Either I am an adult or I have had some kind of extreme brain DNA mutation - WHICH COULD IT BE? Do we really hate vegetables as youngsters, or do we just react to all the anti-veggie propaganda around us? Kids are supposed to hate vegetables...right? Who's kidding who? NO sugar, NO fat, NO salt: OF COURSE KIDS SHOULD HATE VEGGIES! And that's why we adults have to do our duty, and take every opportunity to SHOVE THEM DOWN THIER LITTLE THROATS! Trust me, they'll thank you when they're older... or they won't. Either way, feed them greens and they'll be around long enough to hate you for it! And that's the point.




Fun with veggies!

New outreach. New times. Old  Nemesis: "she whom none can escape".

Says WHO?   After far too long , awareness equals RESULTS. Get your mammograph, do your self check-up and SAVE YOUR LIFE.


The word Nemesis originally meant the distributor of fortune, neither good nor bad.

Now THIS I've heard before! Find someone who does something better than everyone else and then hire them for the job. Only now, after you locate them, clone a bunch more.

http://www.massgeneral.org/cancer/care/adult/thoracic/developments.asp

 Laser guided targeting, 4D topography, Smart targeting cabilities... This is WAR! And it's being fought  Here & Now, Not STAR WARS... but  CANCER WARS.

It seems to have taken a few short years for the Strategic Defensive Intiative (or Star Wars) to blunder and crash  into obscurity, but the the promise of the technology lives on - like the rebel alliance. Small pockets of under-funded, under-staffed and under-equipped rebel thinkers, bending the powers of their combined thoughts to one task - a laser and drug guided radiation system that ZAPS the cancer cells and leaves the healthy tissue undamaged. May the force (In this case, NIH dollars) be with them!

I like to think of radiation oncologists as Yodas, wise men and women with a shaky grip on language and a super-steady, very DEADLY grip on the laser beam. Destroy this menace I will!

Attack of the BUGS! Why did folks in the fifties think that bugs would have to be Gi-normous in order to do humanity in?

 
It really only takes a little one.  Clostridium difficile (C. diff) or E. coli or Staph or Streph... . I mean THEY'RE EVERYWHERE! Getting into EVERTHING, they suck.>>>>>

And this is how THEY ATTACK!!!


I babbled on about MRSA (staph) a while back and at the risk of sounding DOOM! DOOM! and gloomy. Remember to be careful around hospitals.
...and gyms. and schools, cafeterias and public transportation... let me see, what HAVE I forgooten - oh yeah, to breathe!

You are what you eat. 
Carbs are bad.
I'm ALL organic.
Lacto-ovo-vegitarian????
I stopped losing weight, it was making me fat. Every time I lost ten pounds I gained fifteen back.

A'Mangiare

Good health IS NOT just nutritious food... But, Good nutritious food JUST IS good Heath.
Plus a little of this>    That is Charlie Smigelski RD, who came to speak at the hospital I work at on diet and it's effect on HIV positive people.   Interesting guy, great science. Apparently, even cows are too modern for our body to process efficiently. Nuts, berries and protein... from some dubious sources. Very cave-man, that talk left me wandering around the grocery store asking myself: Could I have scavenged this? Is this something I would have hunted for in a pack... or whatever a bunch of cave-persons are... I was surprised to find that there was a LOT of things my fellow cave dwellers and I could have noshed on. 
 <Ar'ee
Ar'ee, my cave buddy (I just can't imagine people way back then saying Charlie, I have been WAY too influenced by Hollywood), would have no problem with the bags of nuts, the apples, pears... the whole produce isle would have been like home, or maybe valhalla. 
He would quickly react to the squabs and game hens, marveling at the ease of cooking - no plucking feathers and eye-balls for hours... unless they were the good parts back then! I wonder if he would have cried at the sight of a thirty pound turkey?
I know sometimes I do, when it has to be stuffed, dressed and in the too-small oven on the too small-cooking pan when it's not QUITE defrosted.
I could make Ar'ee understand a lamb chop, using wild hand gestures my Italian grandfather would be proud of.
But I'm afraid Twinkies, Ranch Dressing and Spam  are another matter all together.


http://hivoverfifty.org/2003_conf_slides/Smigelski.pdf

This is the most wonderful news. It will affect so many people. However, people will now begin to understand that Cervical Cancer in Women and Anal cancer in Gay Men are sexually transmitted. HPV, the cause of these cancers, is a virus. You get this virus as a result of having sex. So... "Let's talk about sex, Baby. Let's talk about you and me. Let's talk about all the good things and the bad things that may be, let's talk about sex."
~Salt 'N' Pepa, "Let's Talk About Sex"      



Once again we will have to decide what to tell children, and the parents of children, and WHEN to tell them MANDATORY vaccinations at 8? Younger? Ask yourself how easy it is to tell parents that they must educate thier children. They must make hard choices.

FDA Panel Endorses Cervical Cancer Vaccine – A Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Advisory Panel has recommended approval of a vaccine for two types of the human papillomavirus (HPV) known to cause about 70 percent of cervical cancer cases. The FDA is expected to approve the vaccine from Merck and Co. sometime next month. Around 3,500 American women and 290,000 women worldwide die of the disease each year. This may be one of the biggest advances in cancer prevention since the Pap test, which tests for abnormal cells in the cervix, was introduced decades ago. Summary based on an article by: The Associated Press

"Sea-Fever"

I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face, and a grey dawn breaking.

I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over.

By John Masefield (1878-1967).
(English Poet Laureate, 1930-1967.)

(Words for my Brother John)

Rituximab (Rituxan ®) Improves Response Rate in Mantle Cell Lymphoma
 Amy Brown

Mythologically, Mab was the Queen of Connact; the warrior queen of the Ulster Cycle. She was the combined mother/warrior aspect of the Triple Goddess.

All of our Chemo Drugs should be given the names of warriors. I had 6 cycles of  "Genghis Khan" and 4 of  "Richard the Lionhearted" just sounds more like what these thing do. They win battles for us. They are great and powerful warriors who conquer at our bidding. In the beginning they might have been brutish and horde-like, but now they are wise and powerful generals. "Next Thursday we start you on "General Patton", he gets the job done!" is how I imagine a conversation going. And let's not have exam rooms, let's meet our doctors in "The War Room" for "Strategy Plans". I don't think uniforms with epaulets would be inappropriate... 



Rituximab (Rituxan ®) Improves Response Rate in Mantle Cell Lymphoma

Keywords

Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, mantle cell lymphoma, rituximab (Rituxan®), monoclonal antibody, targeted therapy. (Definitions of many terms related to cancer can be found in the Cancer.gov Dictionary.)

Summary

Rituximab, when added to standard chemotherapy for initial treatment of mantle cell lymphoma, shrank or eliminated tumors in a significantly higher percentage of patients than the standard chemotherapy (CHOP) alone. Further follow-up is needed to show whether this approach also increases overall survival time.

Source

American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meeting, New Orleans, June 5, 2004.

Background

Rituximab is now widely used in the treatment of various kinds of non-Hodgkin’s B-cell lymphoma. It is known to be effective as the initial treatment of diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, the most common form of the disease, and in other types it has proved effective as second-line treatment (that is, treatment given when the first treatment doesn’t work or stops working). But the drug’s use as initial, or front-line, therapy is still under study in many forms of lymphoma, including mantle cell lymphoma. Mantle cell lymphoma is an aggressive form of the disease and is often resistant to chemotherapy; median survival from time of diagnosis is only three to four years.

Ritiuximab, the first monoclonal antibody to be approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, works by targeting the CD-20 protein often found on the surface of B-cell lymphomas. The antibody binds to the protein, leading to destruction of the cancerous cell.

The Study

The 122 patients in the study were divided randomly into two groups. One received the standard therapy known as CHOP, a combination of cytoxan, adriamycin, vincristine, and prednisone. The other group received CHOP plus rituximab.

The study’s research team was lead by Wolfgang Hiddemann, M.D.,Ph.D., of Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich, Germany.

Results

About 34 percent of the patients receiving CHOP plus rituximab had a complete remission compared to just 7 percent of those receiving CHOP alone. The majority of patients in the rituximab group--94 percent--had either a complete or partial remission compared to 74 percent of those receiving CHOP alone.

Side effects were somewhat more severe in the rituximab group, with more frequent suppression of cells important in the immune system. However, rates of severe infection were only slightly greater among those taking rituximab (7 percent) compared to those taking CHOP alone (5 percent).

“We can really say this benefit had no costs in terms of side effects,” said Hiddeman.

Limitations

The study does not show whether patients treated with rituximab plus CHOP will survive any longer than those in the CHOP-alone group. Also, the results apply only to patients with mantle cell lymphoma, which is one of the less common forms of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

Comments

These findings, added to those of other recent studies with rituximab, suggest that it will be used increasingly as a first-line therapy, said Howard S. Hochster, M.D., a lymphoma researcher at the New York University School of Medicine in New York City. “I think this is strategy you’ll be seeing more and more,” he said.  Culled from NIH website

Tubing misconnections—a persistent and potentially deadly occurrence 

Tubing and catheter misconnection errors are an important and under-reported problem in health care organizations. In addition, these errors are often caught and corrected before any injury to the patient occurs. Given the reality of and potential for life threatening consequences, increased awareness and analysis of these errors—including averted errors—can lead to dramatic improvement in patient safety. 
from: JCAHOnline - March 2006  Read More


Getting your wires crossed, getting your signals mixed, not knowing your ass from your elbow; these are the things that drive us CRAZY. Those little SNAFU's that happen to everyday people THAT CAN SOMETIMES BE DEADLY. Yikes. I'm definately doing the "Not this one" on the leg or arm if something has to go, and I'm going to make sure there are no other  "William Weeden's" in the hospital at the same time looking for an appendix out or  Sex Reassignment Surgery. 
So, the next time you hit "reply all" instead of "reply" ask yourself: OK how bad was that?

JACHO's brochure offers the following suggestions on how you can avoid being the victim of medical errors
 [to obtain a copy of the full brochure, call JCAHO at toll-free 1 (877) 223-6866, or log on to their website at www.jcaho.org]:

 

Rural States Have Lowest Risk, Says EPA 

Just when a guy thinks he has forever escaped the boredom of rural life. BAM! Cities=Bad. 


Although this isn't REALLY such a surprise. Still, I hate to have it be a statistic. That makes it all so real. I remember a friend telling me what I would have to do to live the longest, and healthiest, possible live I could (she was an actuary) I remember thinking "But why would I want that, that's NO fun at all?" What is the best balance a guy could do? 

Give up one year of extra life for an occasional:  Cheese-burger and fries?
Give up one year of extra life for an occasional:  Alcoholic bender?
Give up one year of extra life for an occasional:  Banana split BINGE!
Give up one year of extra life for an occasional:  Smoke-fest?

Decisions, decisions, now I need to calm myself and lie down.
What is one year of your life worth? Come on - I know it's an SUV... 

 Now, breathe.

  

THE TRI-CORDERS are here! THE TRI-CORDERS are here! I want one. Well it's more like a hand held "online look up" device which gives you all the information you need about something... THE TRI-CORDERS are here! THE TRI-CORDERS are here! 

I can't believe I'm a "Label reader", when did I begin to care about fat content and sodium percentages? (Hint: around the time I went from a size 32 to a size 35 ass size) Now, of course, I have to figure out the difference between FIBER and ROUGHAGE. Thank God for whole wheat broccoli pizza!   As I (apparently along with the rest of the country ) expanded my wardrobe (size not quantity) I went on a learning curve. What kind of food? When to eat it? How much to eat? Do I have to exercise? Short answers: More Veggies. More often. MUCH smaller amounts. Yes.
And for all of that I need a new toy MY TRI-CORDER! I could look up food content, track my excerise program, "Why, I can make a hat or a brooch or a pterodactyl"  and other cool stuff... I am saving my pennies now!

Protein linked to cancer spread identified
Wed Mar 29, 2006 6:05 PM GMT
Printer Friendly | Email Article | RSS

By Patricia Reaney

"LONDON (Reuters) - Scientists have identified and blocked the action of a protein linked to the spread of breast, prostate and skin cancer cells to the bones.
The molecule called RANKL is produced in bone marrow. In studies of mice, researchers from Austria and Canada showed that inhibiting the protein could stop the cancerous cells from migrating to the bones.
"RANKL is a protein which tells tumour cells to come to it," said Professor Josef Penninger, of the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Vienna.
"It sits on the bones and when tumour cells circulate in the body then RANKL attracts them into the bones," he told Reuters. "

Protein! I thought that was the "good stuff". I get kind of rankled (get it: RANKL) when people don't jump on a story like this and make it front page news. THIS IS BIG! 


Identity is everything, sort of like BIG being "John"... if it can be named, you know what it is.  Now we just need a little sumpin' sumpin'  that we can slather on to be safe from the BAD SUN yet still get a little color on our faces, and what the hell is it with with my pasty white legs!