• Question: Have you nearly made a discovery for cancer or is there still a long time till that happenes?

    Asked by kirstencymi to Marianne on 15 Jun 2010 in Categories: . This question was also asked by jackster1997, spudlington1, kw28, elmo97, emilyjane.
    • Photo: Marianne Baker

      Marianne Baker answered on 14 Jun 2010:

      Hi kirstencymi,

      Discoveries are constantly being made in the field of cancer research.
      If you mean will there be a ‘cure for cancer’, I’d have to say no – cancer is many hundreds of types of disease (it depends where in the body, what caused it, genes involved, how long it’s developed before treatment, how it responds to treatment etc. etc.).

      We now manage certain cancer types very well; breast cancer, though common, now has a good survival rate. Pancreatic cancer, on the other hand, is still very difficult to treat and survival is low.

      There are many groups around the world working on both the general and specific aspects of different types of cancer – for example here we have pancreatic groups, prostate, breast and many others.

      Every little bit of information the scientific community as a whole can uncover is beneficial to the field. In medicine, it’s rarely one discovery that completely changes everything – rather it’s the accumulation of knowledge and more gradual understanding that means we can treat people more effectively.

    • Photo: anon

      anon answered on 15 Jun 2010:

      Well done Marianne for fielding this one!

      I’d also say that cancer treatment is really interesting. The approach to discovering a therapy has usually focused on stopping the cancer cells proliferating (making more of themselves). Cancer cells are usually much better at proliferating than normal body cells and are usually less prone to dying (in our bodies cells are constantly being produced, dying and being replaced).

      One of the early treatments (still in use) was developed from mustard gas which you might have read about in history as a really nasty chemical weapon. Scientists noticed that when (unfortunately) there was a big explosion on a ship carrying lots of mustard gas some of the sailors/soldiers had trouble making cells properly in their bone marrow (a key site for making blood cells in the body). As these cells are rapidly turned over they thought the same effect might happen on cancer cells. They were right.

      Unfortunately, a lot of the side effects of cancer therapies happen because all rapidly turned over cells(cells that are produced and die quickest) are affected not just the cancer ones. That’s why people can lose their hair, have low blood counts (anaemia and low white blood cell levels) and be prone to infection. They often feel sick and have trouble with their bowels because cells in the digestive system are rapidly turned over to.

Comments