Updated 'Rollercoaster,' a tribute to cancer patient Nancy Fox, slated for August publication

The second edition of Rollercoaster should be ready for a curious public next month. 

With its first major revision in 15 years, the book, which now carries the adjusted subtitle How a man can survive his partner’s breast cancer or any other lethal disease, is up-to-the-minute insofar as medicines, treatments, and where to find help are concerned.

 

The volume, first of four I, Woody Weingarten, wrote since becoming a “retired” elder, contains several totally new chapters. It also features massive rewrites in virtually every other segment. 

Nancy and Woody, circa 1997

Nancy Fox, my musical-genius wife and muse who successfully battled breast cancer for more than three decades, is the heroine of Rollercoaster, a real-life love story and memoir. 

In effect, it is a tribute to her courage and ability to laugh and to genuinely enjoy her life despite having to forever fight off dangerous cells.

Anyone who wants to find information about my other three books should check out my website, www.woodyweingarten.com. 

 

Highlighted there are MysteryDates: How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, which features 70 favorite newspaper columns I penned; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a children’s fantasy aimed at 6- to 10-year-olds that was co-written by my then-8-year-old granddaughter, Hannah Schifrin.

Scientists identify proteins that can predict lung cancers more than five years before diagnosis

"Early research suggests a path to predict and prevent lung cancer."

That was the headline of a recent story by Nina Agrawal that appeared on the online site of The New York Times. 

The subhead? "Scientists have identified proteins that could signal increased lung cancer risk, as well as a drug that could reduce the odds of a tumor developing."

A team of more than 80 researchers "working across four continents have identified a set of proteins in the blood that accurately predict lung cancers more than five years before diagnosis," the story says.

It indicates, too, that the scientists "also found early evidence that an existing anti-inflammatory drug [canakinumab] could significantly reduce lung cancer risk in people with elevated concentrations of these proteins, which they linked to inflammation."

The findings were published in the journal Cell. Lung cancer, the Times story says, "kills more people worldwide than any other cancer." Fewer than one-third of people diagnosed survive past five years.

Dr. Charles Swanton

"Prevention is the solution in my mind," the article quotes Dr. Charles Swanton, oncologist and director of the Francis Crick Institute in the United Kingdom who was senior author of the  paper. 

Swanton, who recently joined the board of Novartis, the maker of canakinumab, also contends that the findings suggest "smoke causes mutations and inflammation, which together cause cancer."

The drug, according to the story, "nearly halved the risk of lung cancer among 2,300 patients in the trial who had higher-than-average expression of the 14 proteins."

Dr. Peter Mazzone, a pulmonologist at the Cleveland Clinic, on the other hand, offers a massive caveat. He's quoted as warning about canakinumab's potential side effects, including increased risk of infection and sepsis, and says that "even within a narrow population, it could still be too toxic for the benefit to outweigh the harms. It's possible that a different medicine that targets the same pathway could work and would be safer." 

More information on new research can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, aVitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my website at https://woodyweingarten.com for details.

Half of the patients with advanced lung cancer, America's deadliest, reject treatment, study says

Fifty-two percent of metastatic lung cancer patients fail to get life-extending treatments, a new study finds.

According to a recent story by Simar Bajaj in The New York Times, the reason they skip such treatments as chemotherapy, immunotherapy. and targeted therapy is, experts suggest, because of "access issues, fatalism, and shame."

The Times article reports that the study, published in JAMA Oncology, "analyzed more than 250,000 people on Medicare between 2006 and 2021, with an average age of 73, and found that the proportion of patients who received these treatments increased only slightly over time, to 48 percent from 45 percent."

More than 110,000 Americans are annually diagnosed with metastatic lung cancer, the deadliest cancer in the United States.

Dr. Carolyn J. Presley

But over the past 15 years, Dr. Carolyn J. Presley, chief of thoracic medical oncology at Ohio State University (who wasn't involved in the study ), is quoted, dozens of promising new drugs have come to market. For some patients, a pill can hold the disease in check for years, "so the fact that so many older adults are not getting treatment is really, really sobering."

Some patients who smoked "might feel like they brought this disease upon themselves," Bajaj's story says,  and — according to Dr. Adam Fox, pulmonologist at the Medical University of South Carolina, who led the study — the stigma not only contributes to diagnostic delays but also to patients feeling unworthy of care.

Fatalism, the lingering belief that metastatic lung cancer is hopeless and treatment is unlikely to help, might be adopted by some primary care and emergency medicine doctors, the article suggests.

As for access issues, "one of the biggest barriers to treatment is not being diagnosed in time. Screening can catch tumors early, but it remains widely underutilized, largely because most people don't know it's available and complicated eligibility criteria make it difficult for docs to figure out who qualifies," Bajaj's piece notes.

More information on Stage 4, metastasized disease can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, aVitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my other website at https://woodyweingarten.com for details.

Supreme Court blocks thousands of suits that claim Roundup weed-killer causes cancer

A new Supreme Court ruling will restrict "one the largest waves of product liability lawsuits in the history of the nation."

According to a dispatch by Justin Jouvenal in today's editions of The Washington Post, the court specifically blocked "thousands of suits claiming Roundup causes cancer."

The court, in a 7-2 decision (liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson and conservative Justice Neil M. Gorsuch voted against), ruled that "Monsanto was not required to offer a warning because the Environmental Protection Agency holds that Roundup's active ingredient, glyphosate, is not a cancer risk," the story says.

The EPA finding, however, contrasts with another by the World Health Organization (WHO), which, Jouvenal's piece says, "found glyphosate was 'probably carcinogenic to humans' after reviewing available research on the chemical. In particular, the agency found a likely link between non-Hodgkin lymphoma and  glyphosate."

In  light of that report, some countries have banned the weed-killer.

Paul D. Clement

Paul D. Clement, attorney for Monsanto, now owned by Bayer, had argued before the Supreme Court that the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA), which regulates the sale and marketing of pesticides and herbicides, "preempts state-court claims" that the company had to warn cancer victims of alleged dangers posed by Roundup because the EPA ruled it was safe.

According to the Post story, the court decision "turned on a technical legal question, but one with enormous stakes. On the line are billions of dollars, the fate of tens of thousands  of lawsuits filed by cancer victims, and the future of an herbicide farmers say is crucial to the nation's food supply but health groups warn is a danger."

Litigation, the article notes, had "prompted Monsanto to remove glyphosate-based Roundup from the consumer market, but it is still available to farmers and commercial users."

More information on lawsuits and disease can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, aVitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my website at https://woodyweingarten.com for details.

Cover design is final obstacle to publication of 2nd edition of Woody Weingarten's 'Rollercoaster'

A single design element yet to be decided for its cover is the final barrier to publication of the second edition of Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer or any other lethal disease.

Believe it or not, I, Woody Weingarten, its author, am still struggling to find the best way to disclose on the cover — without screening screwing up the initial design — that it's a completely updated edition. 

It should, however, be only a few weeks, and the addition of a few minute details on the copyright page, before the book will be made available to the public through vendors like Barnes & Noble and Amazon. Keep an eye on my https://woodyweingarten.com/ website to see when the book is launched.

Nancy Fox

The new volume includes up-to-date information on meds and treatments and where to get help, as well as two fresh chapters about the development of my wife's breast cancer, which returned after almost 30 years. 

Overall, it's even more of a tribute to Nancy Fox's bravery. flexibility, and humanness than was the first edition.

Several chapters have been switched around, for clarity, and new transition chapters have been inserted.

I spent an entire year reworking the book so it is current, easy-to-read (sans medical jargon), and useful as a guide to the emotional rollercoaster breast cancer or any other life-threatening disease might kidnap a patient or partner.

I, a longtime voting member of the San Francisco Bay Area Theater Critics Circle, can be contacted by email at voodee@sbcglobal.net or on both of my websites, https://woodyweingarten.comand https://vitalitypress.com. My books include Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner’s breast cancer, aimed at male caregivers; MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter.

 

Promising pancreatic cancer pill can be taken while it's under regulatory review, FDA says

The Federal Drug Administration (FDA) has expanded access to a promising new drug for pancreatic cancer.

According to a recent story in The Washington Post by Christopher Rowland, "more patients will be able to take the pill while it is under regulatory review. The agency said it recognizes the dire need for a drug to fight one of the most lethal cancers."

The experimental drug was approved two days after the FDA received an access application from the drug's manufacturer, Revolution Medicines.

Dr. Marty Makary

The ultra-quick approval of daraxonrasib "reflects the FDA's strong commitment to facilitate early access to therapies for serious and life-threatening conditions, including pancreatic cancer," the story quotes former FDA Commissioner Marty Makary as saying. 

In trials, the drug "has doubled average survival time for pancreatic cancer patients who have already received conventional treatment," the article continues. "The expanded access program, also known as 'compassionate use,' will be limited to that set of patients as well."

Makary's piece also indicates that the "company said it will provide the drug at no cost to patients in the program. Insurance typically does not cover expanded access drugs before they have been approved."

In one clinical trial, "patients had a median survival of 13.2 months compared with 6.7 months for those people receiving chemotherapy," the story adds.

More information on clinical trials can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, aVitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my website at https://woodyweingarten.com for details.

Controversial former attorney general Pam Bondi recovering from thyroid cancer, Fox News reports

Pam Bondi, Donald J. Trump's former attorney general, is recovering from thyroid cancer, Fox News Digital reports.

According to a recent story by Michael Sinkewicz, Bondi, 60, underwent treatment after leaving the Justice Department in early April. The Fox New website cited a source telling Axios and Katie Miller, ex-White House staffer and podcast host who is married to White House deputy chief of staff for policy Stephen Miller, reposted the report.

Pam Bondi

"Pam has been quietly kicking cancer's ass the last few weeks," she's quoted as having writtten.  

The Fox story did not list any prognosis.

It does say that Axios disclosed Bondi's health update while reported that she's been appointed by Trump to an advisory committee "focused on artificial intelligence policy."

More information on various cancers can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, aVitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my website at https://woodyweingarten.com for details.

Second edition of ‘Rollercoaster,’ now a tribute to wife's bravery, moves closer to publication

I’ve just finished proof-reading the formatted version of Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner’s breast cancer or any other lethal disease. 

 

It’s amazing how many typos popped up. And, of course, I, your favorite now and forever editor, couldn’t help improving things with a word or phrase substitution or addition here and there.

 

So, the fixes are in, so to speak, and we can easily move on to the next pre-publication step.

 

This second edition will be a radically different book than the first. It has totally updated chapters on meds and treatments, and completely new ones on my wife’s mastectomy and metastases. It has 40 extra pages.

 

The book contains, too, new transitional chapters, along with major revamps of every other chapter. Its title is more inclusive.

Woody Weingarten

It still is aimed at male caregivers (and patients of any gender) but it’s now also a tribute to the bravery and perseverance of my wife, as well as a memoir of how we coped with her thrice being diagnosed with breast cancer.

 

Meanwhile, instead of waiting for the new version, you may want to dip into my other VitalityPress books. From my website — www.woodyweingarten.com, in case you forgot — you can order a copy (or two or two thousand, depending on the size of your family and how many folks you call friends).

 

My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship (the title says it all); The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter.

Two pancreatic cancer treatments show promise in clinical trials, New York Times maintains

Two experimental drugs are bringing hope to patients with deadly pancreatic cancer.

According to a recent story by Gina Kolata and Rebecca Robbins in The New York Times, clinical trials show promise for daraxonrasib and a personalized vaccine that employs mRNA technology, best known for its use in Covid-19 vaccines.

 

Researchers presented data supporting this conclusion at a San Diego cancer conference, but neither drug has yet been approved for use. Nor has the data “been published in a medical journal or reviewed by regulators,” the article reveals.

 

Pancreatic cancer kills more than 50,000 Americans each year. “Many patients die within a year of diagnosis, and only 13% of people live for five years after being diagnosed,” the piece says.

Dr. Robert Vonderheide

 Kolata and Robbins quote Dr. Robert Vonderheide, director of the Abramson Cancer Center of the University of Pennsylvania, as saying “the statistic that caught everyone’s eye was a doubling of overall survival…To see that effect with a side-effect profile that is manageable unleashed a lot of excitement  in the field.”

Vonderheide wasn’t involved in the new research but is president-elect of the American Association for Cancer Research, the group of oncologists and scientists that hosted the California meeting.

 

Initial findings of the clinical trials were that daraxonrasib gave patients “over 13 months, compared to less than seven months for those who received chemotherapy.”

 

Pancreatic cancer, the story notes, “is different from many other cancers,” Kolata and Robbins maintain. “It is often caught very late, when the disease has already spread widely, because it often presents no early symptoms.…And treatment approaches like immunotherapy that have transformed the outlook for other cancers have not worked for that of the pancreas.”

 

More information on clinical trials and new drugs can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my website at https://woodyweingarten.com for details.

 

Breast cancer screenings and AI may protect against heart disease, new study suggests

Routine mammograms can “flag the risk of heart disease,” according to a new study in the European Heart Journal.

A recent story by Carolyn Y. Johnson in The Washington Post confirms that information. It also notes that radiologists for decades “have observed that breast cancer screening scans also reveal calcium deposits in the arteries woven through breast tissue, which cause the blood vessels to stiffen.”

According to Johnson, the study shows “how artificial intelligence [AI] can be used…to turn this ‘incidental finding’ into a warning system…a marker of increased risk for heart failure, heart attacks, stroke, and death.”

 

Heart disease is “the leading and often under-recognized cause of death in women,” his Post piece adds.

 

The story says that “studies have shown that many women mistakenly believe that breast cancer is the leading cause of death, and they may not take seriously the much greater risk of heart disease.”

 

Dr. Mary Cushman

Mary Cushman, professor of pathology and laboratory medicine at the University of Vermont, who wasn't part of the study, is quoted to the effect that if women were educated while getting a mammogram, "it could be a game changer."

She also contends, according to an email she wrote, that “it is a clarion call that younger women [under 50] do have risk, that it can be detected, and that detection of risk should lead to interventions.”

 

By 2050, it is projected, “a third of women between the ages of 20 and 44 will have some form of heart disease,” the study says.

 

More information on cancer and heart disease can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my website at https://woodyweingarten.com for details.

Susie Wiles, Chief of Staff for Donald Trump, Reveals She Has Breast Cancer, Will Work Anyway

Susie Wiles, Donald Trump’s chief of staff, plans to keep working while being treated for breast cancer.

Wiles did not announce those facts, the president did. Today. He said the prognosis for his longtime confidante was “beyond excellent,” according to a story by Dan Diamond in The Washington Post.

Susie Wiles

Donald Trump

Two people who spoke on the condition of anonymity to the Post indicate she’s working on White House strategy in regard to this year’s midterm elections, “encouraging officials to focus on affordability and other messages with bipartisan appeal."

Wiles, 68, a longtime political strategist, helped Trump win the state of Florida in 2016, and then managed his 2024 presidential campaign.

The Post piece indicates she’s honing in on “priorities such as drug price cuts and [tamping] down controversies around vaccines.”

According to Diamond’s article, Trump notes on Truth Social that during the treatment period Wiles “will be spending virtually full time at the White House, which makes me…very happy!”

Critics complained that Trump was politicizing breast cancer, just as he's politicized other difficult health and social situations in the past.

The story says that “Wiles has described her role as empowering Trump’s agenda, rather than serving as a check on his impulses, a break from some past chiefs of staff who have said that their most important role was saying no to the nation’s leader.

The piece continues: “She has also described Trump as having ‘an alcoholic’s personality,’ saying he ‘operates [with] a view that there’s nothing he can’t do. Nothing, zero, nothing,” among several comments that were published in a pair of Vanity Fair articles that drew national attention last year.

More information on political activities can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, aVitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my website at https://woodyweingarten.com for details.

Screening for lung cancer, the deadliest in U.S., misses most cases, new study reveals

Because of missed diagnoses, cancer and public health officials are calling for changes in lung cancer screening guidelines.

That conclusion, according to a recent story by Allyson Chiu in The Washington Post, was from a new study published in “JAMA Network Open,” a peer-reviewed journal.

Dr. Ankit Bharat

A majority of the lung cancer patients in this country would not meet the screening criteria as it  exists currently, the Post quoted Dr. Ankit Bharat, the study’s lead author and executive director of the Canning Thoracic Institute at Northwestern Medicine, as saying.

“If we have a more broader screening program, similar to breast and colon, then we would be able to detect substantially more patients at an earlier stage," he added.

 

The story indicates that if screening were made available for anyone between 40 and 80, nearly 94% of lung cancer cases could be detected, preventing at least roughly 26,000 deaths each year — "if even 30% of people get screened.”

 

The study had shown that of approximately 1,000 patients treated at Northwestern Medicine, only 1/3 met the requirements for screening. Eligible were people 50 to 80 who had a history of heavy smoking in the past 15 years, but women, minorities, and people who never smoked “were disproportionately excluded.”

 

Bharat noted that “lung cancer is the biggest cause of cancer deaths in this country. It kills more people than breast, colon, and prostate put together.”

 

The Post piece also quoted Dr. Narjust Florez, a thoracic medical oncologist and co-director of the Young Lung Cancer Program at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, to the effect that “waiting for symptoms leads to most patients having a Stage 4 diagnosis.”

More information on studies can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, aVitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my website at https://woodyweingarten.com for details.

American Cancer Society opens up new guidelines for cervical cancer screening

The American Cancer Society (ACS) has changed its guidelines for cervical cancer, saying self-collected vaginal swab tests are now acceptable.

 

But according to a recent story by Allyson Chiu in The Washington Post, clinician-collected cervical samples “are still preferred.”

 

The tests are aimed at human papillomavirus (HPV), a sexually transmitted infection that “causes nearly all cervical cancers,” the article maintains

 

Jane Montealegre

Self-collection could be "a game-changer for increasing screening, Chiu quotes Jane Montealegre, associate prof in the  department of behavioral sciences at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, as saying.

Roughly 13,000 new cases of the disease are diagnosed in the United Staters annually, and about 4,000 women die, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

 

Chiu writes that data shows that screening rates have declined in the past 20 years — although cancer incidence had been cut by more than half since the mid-1970s.

 

Montealegre — who also claims that most insurance should cover HPV testing, including self-collected — says a self-collected test could be a good option for women who aren’t comfortable getting as pelvic exam or don’t have access to one. 

 

But, she adds, if you’re interested in self-collection, you should ask your physician to make the option available, and you should make sure the test you use has received Federal Drug Administration (FDA) approval.

 

“If they’re not FDA-approved, I wouldn't trust that as a valid screening test,” the Post quoted her again.

More information on new medical guidelines can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my website at https://woodyweingarten.com for details.

Marathon and extreme runners much more likely to have pre-cancerous colon polyps, study says

A new study conducted by a Virginia doctor shows that comparatively young marathon and ultra-marathon runners are more apt to have pre-cancerous colon growths.

Dr. Timothy Cannon

The study by oncologist Timothy Cannon, who tested colonoscopies at the Inova Schar Cancer Institute in Fairfax, Va., on 100 volunteers aged 35 to 50, was showcased yesterday in a story by Roni Caryn Rabin in The New York Times.

"The results," the article says, "were staggering. Almost half the participants had polyps, and 15 percent had advanced adenomas likely to become cancerous."

The new study, the piece continued, "comes amid heightened concerns about a rise in colon and rectal cancer rates among adults under 50, a population that  historically has had a low risk of cancer."

Cannon, who ran the New York City marathon in 2010, is quoted believing that "after what I've seen from my patients and what we've found here, that extreme exercise may increase the risk."

As for continuing to run, he added that "you never want to give people an excuse not to exercise, because by and large we have bigger problems from people not exercising enough.

More information on what can cause the disease can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my website at https://woodyweingarten.com for details.

3 out of 5 liver cancers are preventable, new study discovers; cases could double in 25 years

Sixty percent of the 700,000 people who die each year from liver cancer could be prevented, reports a new study published in the journal Lancet.

That comprehensive research, according to a recent story by Nina Agrawal in The New York Times, finds that "prevention could be accomplished by addressing the disease's major causes: hepatitis B, hepatitis C, alcohol-associated liver disease, and liver disease linked to metabolic risk factors like obesity."

Dr. Brian P. Lee

The Times article quotes Dr. Brian P. Lee, an associate professor of medicine at the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California, who was not involved in the study, to the effect that "liver cancer is common, it causes immense suffering and death, and the saddest part for me as a physician is that most of the cases are preventable."

Liver cancer is the sixth most common cancer and the third leading cause of death each year from cancer. There are nearly 900,000 new annual cases globally, Agrawal's piece indicates.

The story also quotes Dr. Ahmed Kaseb, a professor of gastrointestinal medical oncology at the University of University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, who also wasn't associated with the study, as suggesting that the threat of liver cancer from heavy alcohol use and metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease, or MASLD, formerly known as nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, "has been under-recognized and underestimated." 

Dr., Hashem El-Serag, chair of the department of medicine at Baylor College of Medicine in Texas and one of the authors of the new study, maintains that a vast majority of liver cancers arise in people with cirrhosis, advanced and largely irreversible scarring of the liver, which is definitively linked to heavy  alcohol consumption.

More information on the variety of cancers can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my website at https://woodyweingarten.com for details.

Face of lung cancer — once older men with a history of smoking — has changed significantly

Many lung cancers are now found in non-smokers, and scientists want to know why.

According to the headline of a story by Nina Agrawal and Allison Jiang in The New York Times early this week, "the face of lung cancer — once older men with a history of smoking — has changed." Significantly.

Lung cancer is the deadliest cancer in the United States, notes the article that then goes on to say that "the disease's incidence and death rates have dropped over the last few decades, thanks largely to a decline in cigarette use, but lung cancers unrelated to smoking have persisted."

Worldwide, "roughly 10 to 25 percent of lung cancers now occur in people who have never smoked," the piece continues, "Among certain groups of Asian and Asian American women, that share is estimated to be 50 per cent or more."

Dr. Maria Teresa Landi

The thinking used to be that smoking was "almost the only cause of lung cancer," the story quotes Dr. Maria Teresa Landi, a senior investigator at the National Cancer Institute, which is part of the National Institutes of Health. 

Landi is studying "the role that environmental exposure, genetic mutations, or other risk factors might play. She and other researchers "have already found some early hints, including a clear link to air pollution," Agrawal and Jiang's article states.

The piece also quotes Dr. Heather Wakelee, chief of oncology  at the Stanford University School of Medicine, to the effect that "we all still think about the Marlboro man as whaat lung cancer looks like." 

In many cases, however, that's no longer the case. "We're just baffled as to why," Wakelee adds.

One large study led by Landi and colleagues at the University of California, San Diego, the Times story reports, "is looking at the mutational signatures, or patterns of mutations across the cancer genomes, of 871 non-smokers with lung cancer from around the world."

Their latest findings from the study, dubbed Sherlock Lung and published in Nature this month, "showed that certain mutations, or changes to DNA, were much more common in people who lived in areas with high amounts of air pollution —  for example, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Uzbekistan," the article says.

More information on the multiple kinds of cancer can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten, aimed at caregivers. I am, in fact, hard at work on a second edition. 

My other books are Mystery Dates — How to keep the sizzle in our relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my blog at https://woodyweingarten.com for more info on them.

Cutting-edge cancer therapy offers hope for cure for patients with lupus, New York Times reports

A relatively new treatment called CAR T-cell therapy appears to stop lupus in its tracks, according to a recent story by Nina Agrawal in The New York Times.

Her article explains that the treatment is "a kind of 'living drug' that modifies patients' immune cells to help them attack misbehaving ones."

Agrawal's piece quotes Dr. Lisa Sammaritano, a rheumatologist at the Hospital for Special Surgery — Weill Cornell Medicine and the lead author of a set of recently updated guidelines for lupus treatment, as saying, "It's really promising, and honestly the first therapy that we've talked about as a cure. [Until now] we haven't had a cure — we've had control." 

She adds a major caveat, to the effect that she's "hoping that it's a common future therapy, but we're not at the point yet where we can say that with confidence."

CAR T-cell therapy, the Times story notes, is one that "must be personalized to each patient [and therefore] is extraordinarily expensive." One-time costs approach half a million dollars or more.

Symptoms of lupus typically appear between the ages of 15 and 44, with 90 percent of the 3 million patients worldwide being women.

Dr. Meghan Sise

Half of lupus patients, the Agrawal story says, "have inflammation in their kidneys, a condition known as lupus nephritis. Between 10 and 30 percent of these patients will eventually need dialysis or a kidney transplant transplant, [says] Dr. Meghan Sise, the director of onconephrology at Massachusetts General Hospital."

Dr. April Barnado

The disease can cause joint pain, rashes, severe fatigue, and inflammation in organs, the story quotes Dr.. April Barnado, rheumatologist and assistant professor of medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, as saying.

It often strikes, she adds, "at a time when women are raising families, or they're caregiving, or they're trying to get promoted at work. They wake up and feel like they have the flu or a viral infection a few days a week every week. That's pretty debilitating."

Lupus, formally labeled systemic lupus erythematosus, according to the article "is an autoimmune condition in which he body develops antibodies against its own DNA and other cellular material.  The name derives fro m the Latin for 'wolf,' because the skin lesions the disease sometimes causes were once thought to resemble wolf bites, some say." 

More information on treatments and drugs can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my blog at https://woodyweingarten.com for even more info.

Camera examination of ancient skull shows that Egyptians tried to remove cancer 4,500 years ago

By examining an Egyptian skull from 4,500 years ago, an archeologist and his team apparently have "changed the previously understood timeline of when humans may have tried to treat cancer." 

A story by Ben Brasch in editions of The Washington Post a while back quotes archeologist Edgard Camarós, PhD professor at the University of Santiago de Compostela in Spain, as saying "it was clear that we were looking at a milestone in the history of medicine. That was one of those eureka moments." 

Camarós and his team maintain that they've "found proof that moves forward our under landing of when humans treat to treat cancer by 1,000 years."

Edgard Camarós

The team recently published a report in the Frontiers in Medicine journal explaining how they used new camera-and-screen technology and how the markings they found indicate that ancient scientists were trying to remove cancer from a skull.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, cancer was the second-leading cause of death in the United States in 2022.

More information linking research and diseases can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten, aimed at caregivers.

Immunotherapy in clinical trial takes one-third of patients from hopelessness to a potential cure

Despite multiple myeloma having been considered incurable, a third of patients in a clinical trial have lived without detectable cancer for five years.

Patients in the trial conducted by Johnson & Johnson researchers had been facing "certain, and extremely painful, death within a year," according to a story by Gina Kolata in yesterday's editions of The New York Times.

But after five years, the immunotherapy developed by Legend Biotech, a company founded in China, seems to have made the cancer disappear in a third of the patients — "a result never before seen in this disease."

Dr. Norman Sharpless

"In my 30 years in oncology, we haven't talked about curing myeloma," the Times quoted Dr. Norman Sharpless," professor of cancer policy and innovation at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine and a former director of the National Cancer Institute. "This is the first time we are really talking seriously about cure in one of the worst malignancies imaginable."

The study by Johnson & Johnson, which has an exclusive licensing agreement with Legend Biotech, was published in The Journal of Clinical Oncology and reported yesterday at the annual conference of the American Society of Clinical Oncology.

"The Legend immunotherapy is a type known as CAR-T," Kolata's article explains. "It is delivered as an infusion of the patient’s own white blood cells that have been removed and engineered to attack the cancer. The treatment has revolutionized prospects for patients with other types of blood cancer, like leukemia."

Treatments for multiple myeloma are extremely costly. They can run more than $100,000 —  "hideously expensive," according to Dr. Carl June of the University of Pennsylvania. Total cost over the years can be millions of dollars, usually paid by insurers, "and it doesn't even cure you," he told the Times.

Thirty-six thousand Americans each year develop the deadly blood disease, which eats away at bones so it looks as though holes have been punched out in them, elaborates June. Bones can collapse. 

"It's a horrible, horrible death," says June.

More information on clinical trials can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Find out more on my blog, https://woodyweingarten.com.

Biden and his allies are 'very optimistic' about his ability to beat metastasized prostate cancer

Former President Joe Biden

Former President Joe Biden and those around him appear to be sanguine about his being able to whip his metastasized prostate cancer — even though there is no cure.

Looking forward to his recovery, he specifically told reporters last week that "we're going to be able to beat this."

According to an online story by Sebastian Murdock in the HuffPost, he also said, "The prognosis is good. We're working on everything. It's moving along, and I feel good. All the folks are very optimistic."

Earlier last month the 82-year-old was diagnosed with the Stage 4 cancer that had metastasized to the bone. Biden's office admitted it was "a more aggressive form of the disease."

In a chat with reporters at his home, Biden said, "The expectation is we're going to be able to beat this...It's not in any organ, my bones are strong."

The New York Times earlier had quoted Dr. Judd Moul, a prostate cancer expect at Duke University, as saying that men whose prostate cancer had metastasized "can live five, seven, 10 more years." 

He noted that "survival rates have almost tripled in the last decade."

More information on metastasis can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of 70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter. Check out my website, https://woodyweingarten.com/.