WSJ: Adding Heat to Cancer Therapy

[question everything]

The Wall Street Journal

Adding Heat to Cancer Therapy

By LAURA JOHANNES
April 18, 2006; Page D4

The next hot thing in cancer treatment may be...heat. Recent studies show that adding hyperthermia, or heat therapy, to traditional radiation and chemotherapy can boost their effectiveness in certain cancers. Oncologists say the newest research is promising, but there is still limited evidence that hyperthermia prolongs survival. In hyperthermia, the cancerous area of the body is heated to up to 113 degrees Fahrenheit using a variety of methods, including microwave antennas, hot-water baths and infrared lamps. The therapy can take two hours or more, and is often repeated over several weeks. Depending on the heating method, narcotics or sedatives may be used to ease discomfort. One big risk is accidental burns -- which range from minor blisters to third-degree scalding.

(snip)

In the Journal of Clinical Oncology last year, scientists at Duke University Medical Center found that heat boosted the effect of radiation on tumors that occur on or just under the skin, in a variety of cancers. The biggest benefit was in patients who weren't able to get a full dose of radiation because they had had it previously. In that group, 68.2% of the patients who got radiation plus heat had their tumors disappear entirely, compared with only 23.5% of those who got radiation alone.

Many of the patients in that study had breast cancer that recurred on the chest wall after mastectomy. Based on the study, heat therapy is now standard at Duke for these patients, says Ellen L. Jones, the paper's lead author. Since many of the patients had rapidly spreading cancer, the study didn't show a survival benefit. Dr. Jones believes the therapy does extend life for some patients. At least, she says, it makes patients' final months less painful by shrinking tumors.

Heat is also being used to treat cancers in the abdominal cavity, which are usually the result of the spread of other cancers. Surgeons cut open the patient and remove tumors in the abdomen. Then -- in the hopes of killing remaining cancer cells -- they bathe the abdominal cavity with hot water and chemotherapy medicine. The therapy appears to be enormously helpful to treat spreading cancer of the appendix, says Paul Mansfield, an oncologist at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. However, he adds, for other cancers, such as gastric and colon, more research is needed.

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URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB114531122731828000.html (subscription)

[amitten]

1. I once read of an interesting way to treat cancer (not in U.S.).

The doctor takes a sample of cells from the tumor. The cells are given (outside the body) several types of treatment: chemo, radiation, etc.

Whichever treatment kills the cells most effectively is then administered to the patient. Simple genius. But it probably costs a lot less and is more effective...cancer is a very profitable disease for some, y'know. $$$

[DianaForRussFeingold]

2. Thank you, I have relatives with cancer.

My sister inlaw had breast cancer at age 30.Then Brain Tumor, I have another with thyroid Cancer,I think they get treatments about every 6 months, I will tell them. I will bookmark this.:hi: :yourock:

[question everything]

3. So sorry to hear about this

I hope that they get access to the best treatments available.

[renate]

4. nothing new, damnit

Hyperthermia was an old treatment for cancer.

http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/factsheet/Therapy/hyperthermia

I wrote a paper on this once. The problem is that it's difficult to get the high temperatures to the tumor via external applications, but when it's possible, it does dramatically increase the effectiveness of the overall treatment.

More than a hundred years ago doctors noticed that patients who were allowed to spike sustained high fevers (105 degrees and up) had a higher recovery rate from cancer. Too bad you can't patent fevers--it might have gotten some research a lot earlier. It was never a guaranteed treatment, of course--but it should have at least been researched long ago.

[KT2000]

5. I seem to recall

there was a clinic in Germany that specialized in this treatment. I don't know if it is still operating but did some time ago. It was considered an alternatuive therapy so it was ridiculed.
I wish mainstream medicine would open their eyes to the possibilities that exist in alternative medicine instead of destroying the practitioners.