DEar Lil,
Thanks for this info.
God Bless YOu
marty
> Lillian wrote:
>
> LAKE TAHOE, Nev. -- As the average age of Americans rises, preventing
> prostate cancer is becoming a vital area of research, and the focus is
> turning from general recommendations about diet, such as eating less
> fat and more fruits and vegetables, to exploring specific agents,
> including vitamins and drugs.
>
> About 30 percent of men between ages 30 and 39 have at least some
> cancer cells in their prostate, and that number rises to 50 percent
> for men in their fifties, said William G. Nelson, M.D., a medical
> oncologist at Johns Hopkins University Hospital in Baltimore.
>
> "It's a staggering thought, even as the population gets older on
> average," he added.
>
> To prevent these indolent cancers from turning aggressive, scientists
> are exploring the effects of a variety of substances, ranging from
> chemotherapeutic drugs used for other cancers to substances found in
> foods. At the Advances in Human Breast and Prostate Cancer conference
> here recently, researchers discussed this burgeoning area of research
> called chemoprevention.
>
> One of the more promising possible chemopreventive agents comes from a
> class of drugs called selective estrogen receptor modulators (SERMs).
> These are thought to act by plugging into certain proteins on the
> surface of cells, thereby preventing estrogen from binding to those
> same sites and promoting cell growth.
>
> Blake Lee Neubauer, Ph.D., is one researcher looking at a specific
> SERM with the minimalist name LY353381-HCI to explore its potential
> for preventing the growth and spread of prostate cancer. It's already
> being tested in phase II randomized trials for women with breast
> cancer, and considering the hormone-based growth of prostate cancer,
> it's being investigated for use in men with that disease as well.
>
> "[SERMs] may be useful in chemotherapy and prevention of both breast
> and prostate cancers," he said.
>
> For prostate cancer, Neubauer, a senior research scientist at Eli
> Lilly Research Laboratories in Indianapolis, discussed experiments
> involving LY353381-HCI and a line of hormone-sensitive prostate cancer
> cells called LNCaP. His team is using the SERM to target an estrogen
> receptor in the cell line called ER beta, with the goal of inhibiting
> hormone-induced cell proliferation. Six days after exposure, they
> found the SERM did just that.
>
> The next step was to study the effects of the SERM on LNCaP cells
> implanted in mice. The drug was found to have a marked anti-tumor
> effect, and was well tolerated by the mice. "It also extends the time
> to treatment failure [in the animals]," he said.
>
> The question the team is now exploring is whether the drug was
> mimicking chemical castration, a commonly used therapy against
> hormone-sensitive prostate cancers that blocks the body's production
> of hormones.
>
> "SERMs are worthy of testing," Neubauer said. "They have the kind of
> activity that may be relevant in prostate cancer therapy."
>
> And Don't Forget Antioxidants
>
> Also of potential relevance to the prevention of prostate cancer is a
> collection of agents ranging from a substance found in tomatoes, to
> vitamins.
>
> Among the major cancers, prostate cancer is the least understood from
> an epidemiological point of view, observed Ronald Ross, M.D., an
> epidemiologist from the University of Southern California in Los
> Angeles, "which makes it difficult to target prevention pathways."
>
> Some substances that merit future research in Ross's view are
> antioxidants, androgen suppressors and vitamin D. "Each of the
> pathways [these substances affect] has several biological goals in
> common," he said, which are decreasing cellular proliferation,
> increasing cellular differentiation (return to a normal mature form),
> increasing apoptosis (programmed cell death) and decreasing mutations.
>
> Based on a 1993 study out of the California-based Kaiser-Permanente
> group, there's evidence supporting vitamin D as a chemopreventive
> agent, Ross said. But scientists are still working out how to prevent
> hypercalcemia, a common side effect of taking too much of the vitamin.
>
> The antioxidants include selenium, lycopenes and vitamin E.
> Antioxidants neutralize free radicals, which can cause potentially
> cancer-stimulating DNA mutations.
>
> A Harvard study found that men with higher selenium levels had a
> reduced risk for prostate cancer, and a study out of the University of
> Arizona reported that men who took 200 micrograms of selenium had 63
> percent fewer prostate cancers than a control group. Both studies are
> preliminary and need confirmation.
>
> Lycopenes, found mainly in tomatoes, have been receiving more and more
> attention, he added. "Overall I find the evidence fairly convincing,"
> Ross said. "Lycopenes warrant further study as a chemopreventive
> agent."
>
> There's very little direct evidence that vitamin E protects against
> prostate cancer, he said, but there is some secondary evidence of
> efficacy. Ross cited a study of lung cancer in Finnish men who smoked
> and were given vitamin E. The men were tracked for six years, and it
> turned out those who received the supplements had a significant
> reduction in prostate cancer incidence and mortality. "It obviously
> looks like an agent that deserves further study," he noted.
> Warmly, lillian
>
> We invite you to take a look at our
> Album.
> www.angelfire.com/sc/molangels/index.html
>
> ( Very informational, good tips, Molers pictures, art work and much
> more....
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