Japan's National Cancer Institute running clinical trials for a new form of radiation therapy

Particle-accelerator-based boron-neutron capture therapy (BNCT), a new form of radiation therapy that promises to be more effective at eliminating certain tumors, has begun clinical trails in Japan.

Many forms of cancer are quite difficult to treat with current modalities, the dreaded glioblastoma multiforme (a particularly deadly form of brain tumor) comes to mind. It's shown nearly complete resistence to all the conventional, and some less common, treatment methods; The 5-year survival rate for someone diagnosed with a GBM sits at less than 5%. But thanks to a new form of radiation treatment being tested in Japan by the National Cancer Institute, patients with tumors like GBMs may soon see a huge improvement in survival.  

Multiple Sclerosis patient dies after controversial new treatment

A controversial and yet unproven treatment has claimed the life of a Canadian patient suffering from MS.

There has been a lot of buzz recently over a suggested treatment for patients suffering from multiple sclerosis (MS). A recent, yet obscure, research paper published by Zamboni P. et al. (2009) has suggested that multiple sclerosis, a debilitating neurological disease that can leave one with severely impaired movement and motor function, is caused by blocked or impaired veins in the head / neck that lead to problems in blood flow. The paper thus suggests that treatment for MS would be possible by opening up these blocked veins.

CyberKnife

Robotic Radiosurgery. How robots are becoming a part of the cure for one of the most horrid of human ailments. Video Inside!

Posted by Alexandru Nicolae

Image Credit: Howie Blog. www.howiehanson.com

Because it's Mustache November (for those that don't know, it involves growing a mustache in support of finding a cure for prostate cancer), I thought I would do a short piece on cancer treatment. But me being the tech-junkie that I am, I've decided to discuss a cool new piece of cancer-fighting technology that few people know about. It's called CyberKnife, and it's robotic, missle-guided, radiosurgery. Let that sink in before you read the rest, I'll wait here...

Take the bitter pill. How an accidental discovery may make asthma a thing of the past.

A new paper published by Nature Medicine has found that your lungs contain taste receptors, and they can specifically sense bitterness!

Dr. Stephen B. Liggett MD, a pulmonologist at University of Maryland School of Medicine, and his team of researchers discovered the bitter taste receptors (TAS2Rs) by accident while studying human airway smooth muscle (ASM) receptors. What's even more surprising is that the TAS2 receptors found in the lung's smooth muscle cells are identical to those found on your tongue. There are a few exceptions of course; the lung's taste receptors are not grouped together like they are in the tongue (better known as taste buds), and they have no sensory link to the brain, which explains why you can't taste awful bitterness every time you travel to a very polluted city and simply inhale.

The Haiti cholera outbreak and why we should be remembering Dr. John Snow.

The recent tragedy of the cholera outbreak in Haiti had gotten me thinking about water sanitation in the west and how much we take it for granted. It also got me thinking about one of the great founders of epidemiology, Dr. John Snow, a physician living in 19th century London.

Snow was famous for having done extensive research on anesthesia, primarily chloroform and ether (lovely smelling chemical by the way, reminds me of a dentist's office). He was also physically present and administering chloroform as a method of obstetrical anesthesia to good old Queen Victoria as she was pumping out two of her nine kids.

His greatest achievement, however was in founding the science of epidemiology. He did this through the study of a cholera outbreak that occurred in 1854 in a small town called Soho. He essentially got a map of the town and began visiting and interviewing as many people he could talk to about their health., their lifestyle habits etc. Through extensive probing, he discovered that all the towns folk who contracted cholera did so after drinking or bathing in water from one specific well: the Broad street pump. He eventually convinced those using the well to stop, and the cholera cases soon disappeared. Because of his proper mapping of the town's citizens who were affected by the disease, Snow was able to construct one of the first epidemiological maps, which again showed the cases of disease spread around the Broad street pump. It was later discovered that the pump was dug several feet away from an open sewage pit, with fecal matter entering the water supply.

His work not only founded an entire branch of science, but also helped solidify a link between contaminated water and disease. If you ask me, that's one of the finest discoveries of science that we take for granted every day.

Most of the world's population who are still affected by diarrheal diseases nowadays are from developing countries like Haiti, and the majority of those victims are children, the ones who can tolerate it the least. I once caught viral gastroenteritis: non stop vomiting and ...well, you know, the "other" thing. The treatment ended up being bed rest and some diluted gatorade, and I even complained about that. To image that many of these people may die from something similar either makes one feel really depressed or really lucky. Maybe it's a bit of both.