Red wine has long been touted as a health elixir. Now wine's purported health-giving ingredient, resveratrol , is available in daily supplements, beverages and even a new nutritional bar claimed by sellers to help you live longer and help prevent cancer and other diseases. Until recently, the evidence for resveratrol has been animal data, but preliminary human testing has yielded intriguing results.

Abstract

When it comes to cancer, it’s important for patients to have an advance care plan -- a healthcare proxy or a living will or both. A proxy carries out healthcare choices in the event the patient cannot.

The overall incidence of bisphosphonate-associated osteonecrosis of the jaw is relatively low. Preventative measures such as maintaining good oral hygiene are likely the best management strategy for the disorder.

Up to 90 percent of multiple myeloma patients develop bone lesions. Lesions form when cells responsible for bone formation are either suppressed or absent and cells responsible for reabsorbing bone are overactive.

Multiple myeloma patients can experience bone destruction in any type of bone. Almost half of the patients suffer bone lesions in the spine; around one third are affected in the skull, pelvis, and ribs; and under one quarter are affected in the humeri, femora, and mandible.

Abstract

Purpose: Renal impairment is a frequent complication of multiple myeloma (MM) and is associated with significant morbidity and increased early death rate. Bortezomib is active and well tolerated in patients with MM who present or develop renal impairment.

Abstract

Cancer-related pain is a major issue of healthcare systems worldwide. The reported incidence, considering all stages of the disease, is 51%, which can increase to 90% in the advanced and terminal stages. For advanced cancer, pain is moderate to severe in about 40–50% and very severe or excruciating in 25–30% of cases.

Question

A patient has been receiving MS Contin® (controlled-release oral morphine), 60 mg twice daily, for about 22 months. She had excellent pain relief for the first 13 months, but since then has had increasing frequency and severity of breakthrough pain. Does this indicate tolerance? Is it safe to continue increasing the dose?

New Ulm, Minn. —  A 13-year-old cancer patient who fled the state with his mother rather than face chemotherapy is now well enough to work on the family farm and jump on his trampoline, a family spokesman said.

A diagnosis of cancer is usually a life-changing event, and helping patients with this realization can be as important as reviewing their physical well-being, says Robert Fisher, MD, a medical oncologist from the Rocky Mountain Cancer Centers, in Longmont, Colorado.

Excessive attention is given to the active treatment of the cancer and not enough on the period that follows, when patients may be struggling with "the burden of survivorship," he suggests in an essay published online June 29 in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

A study involving 678 individuals who apply pesticides, culled from a U.S. Agricultural Health Study of over 50,000 farmers, recently found that exposure to certain pesticides doubles one's risk of developing an abnormal blood condition called MGUS (monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance) compared with individuals in the general population. The disorder, characterized by an abnormal level of a plasma protein, requires lifelong monitoring as it is a pre-cancerous condition that can lead to multiple myeloma, a painful cancer of the plasma cells in the bone marrow.

The huge meta-analysis of individual patient data that confirmed an increased mortality in cancer patients treated with erythropoiesis-stimulating agents (ESAs) has been published in the May 2 issue of the Lancet.

The researchers analyzed individual data for 13,933 cancer patients participating in 53 trials, and found that ESAs increased the relative risk for mortality by 17%. When they considered only cancer patients who were undergoing chemotherapy (10,441 patients in 38 trials), they found that ESAs increased the relative risk by 10%.

Docosahexanoic acid (DHA), an omega-3 fatty acid found in fish oils, has been shown to reduce the size of tumours and enhance the positive effects of the chemotherapy drug cisplatin, while limiting its harmful side effects. The rat experiments provide some support for the plethora of health benefits often ascribed to omega-3 acids.

AIMS: The debate on the funding and availability of cytotoxic drugs raises questions about the contribution of curative or adjuvant cytotoxic chemotherapy to survival in adult cancer patients. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We undertook a literature search for randomised clinical trials reporting a 5-year survival benefit attributable solely to cytotoxic chemotherapy in adult malignancies.