New Study Shows Aspirin can Dramatically Reduce Death by Cancer

New research suggests that long-term use of a daily low-dose aspirin can exponentially decrease the risk of dying from a wide array of cancers. In the report, coming from eight long term studies including some 25,000 patients, British researchers found that a small, 75 milligram dose of aspirin taken daily for at least five years reduces risk of dying from common cancers roughly 10 to 60 percent. The findings are as follows:

• After 5 years of daily aspirin, death due to gastrointestinal cancers decreased by 54%.
• After 20 years, death due to prostate cancer decreased by 10%
• After 20 years, death due to lung cancer decreased by 30% (among those with adenocarcinomas, typically seen in nonsmokers)
• After 20 years, death due to colorectal cancer decreased by 40%
• After 20 years, death due to esophageal cancer decreased by 60%

While this is great news for those who suffer from cancers, Professor Peter Rothwell of the University of Oxford and John Radcliffe Hospital says a daily aspirin regimen can cause complications such as bleeding. Still, it is surprising to know such an affective drug can easily be found in any household.

Source[Yahoo!News]

Healthcare and Web 2.0

Here's a fascinating video showing how Web 2.0 technologies can affect healthcare. With mobile and cloud-based computing taking off, how can pharmaceutical companies and large health systems improve? Tim O’Reilly answers these questions at this years Health 2.0 conference.

Source [The Healthcare Blog]

New Drug to Fight Sickle Cell Disease

AesRx, LLC has announced that it plant to enter into a collaboration with the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to take their new sickle cell therapeutic drug, Aes-103, through pre-clinical development and initial clinical trials. Sickle cell anemia is a potentially life threatening disorder that affects red blood cells. People with sickle cell disease have red blood cells that contain mostly hemoglobin* S, an abnormal type of hemoglobin. Sometimes these red blood cells become sickle-shaped (crescent shaped) and have difficulty passing through small blood vessels. Aes-103 is still in its orphan stage, but it apparently targets and reduces blood cell sickling, and it the only drug of its kind to do so. This collaboration will give those afflicted with the disease a chance for a partial cure.

Source [OneMedSentinel]

New Drugs to Combat Breast Cancer

Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center is currently testing three new drugs meant to combat so-called triple negative breast cancers. Triple negative breast cancer refers to when woman lack estrogen, progesterone and human epidermal growth factor 2 ( also known as the three hormone receptors). The first drug, called Entinostat, claims to "blocks an enzyme that unfolds DNA, providing regulatory molecules access to genes within and also reactivates a gene called retinoic acid receptor-beta". The next drug called All Trans Retinoic Acid "binds a protein made by the reactivated RARβ gene". It is said that these two drugs combined can stop cancer growth in its tracks. They are hoping to start clinical trials next year. 

Looking Forward

As I reflect back on this semester and this blog, I'm left with mixed feelings. This was a new experience for me, and while I think I did achieve in bringing interesting medical tech related posts here, everything didn't go as planned. My posts became way too far apart, and there were long periods of time were nothing was updated. Unfortunately, it seems I can't actually create and stick to a schedule of posting articles(or doing anything, really). In that way, I don't think blogging is right for me. However, I did learn many new and fascinating things by writing articles and looking for source, as well as by reading the blogs of my fellow classmates. I think I also have some new found respect for bloggers.
Anyway, it was an interesting experience overall. I can't promise I will keep this blog going, but I don't think I'll just throw away something that I spent time on either.

The Future of Medicine - Megatrends in Healthcare

Here's a great video detailing the future trends of healthcare in the coming 5 to 15 years. These include personalized medicine [custom tailored medicine]; prevention; much improved repair, restoration; or replacement of damaged organs or tissues; the electronic medical record and better quality and safety.

New, Cheaper Way to Analyze DNA

Mapping the human genome in it's entirety for the first time was an enormous project seven years ago, costing about 3 billion US dollars in total. Today, researchers at the Delft University of Technology and Oxford University may have found a way to have your genome mapped for only a few hundred Euros. This involves the use of a new device called a nanopore, which is described as a "minute hole" which can "'read' information from a single molecule of DNA as it threads through the hole." Apparently it works by applying an electrical charge on it, which allows it to pull DNA molecules individually. It is then read similar to how "music is read from an old cassette tape as it is threaded through a player."
While this technology is obviously meant to improve lives by allowing for early treatment to any predisposed diseases or conditions a person may contract, there are consequences as well. Unfortunately, this information can be used against you if it's not kept completely confidential. For example, insurance companies can determine whether or not to provide coverage depending on how genetically predisposed you are to any kind of disease. Hopefully there will be a solution for this problem once this practice starts to take off in the future.

Source [The Science Daily]

Treating Depression Through Information Technology

Depression is on route to becoming the world leading cause of disability by 2020, according to Maja Hadzic, Fedja Hadzic and Tharam Dillon of the Digital Ecosystems and Business Intelligence Institute, at Curtin University of Technology. They say that unlike other epidemics such as the flu where there is a specific pathogen, there is not one single "source" of depression. Therefore, they say the best way to combat depression is through early diagnosis through the use of information technology.
The team of three have created a system which combines patient data with the data describing mental health of therapists and their interaction with the patients. They say that this data can easily be mined, revealing patterns in the onset, treatment and management of depression. These patterns can not only further increase our knowledge of depression, but also allow for far more personalized care, considering no two cases of depression are exactly the same.
This seems to be a far better approach to depression rather that prescribing the harsh antidepressants popular today. Considering depression can indirectly cause other conditions such as high blood pressure of diabetes, hopefully the use of information technology can allow for the early diagnosis and development of new treatments for depression.
Source [The Science Daily]