Everyone knows (or should know) that smoking causes lung cancer. If you think about it, you’ll realize that your mouth, throat and voicebox can’t get out of the way. They are exposed to the cancer-causing chemicals in tobacco smoke as well. Sure enough, smoking causes mouth, throat and voicebox cancer. In addition, it’s important...
Read more →The management of clinically localized prostate cancer, or cancer that has not spread beyond the prostate gland, is complex. There are a number of treatment options, ranging from close observation with frequent reassessment (active surveillance), surgery, and radiation therapy. While each form of active treatment can be effective, all can cause side effects that...
Read more →Coping with Cancer magazine recently invited me to write an article on facing fear after a cancer diagnosis. In my role as Director of Psychiatry at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, I help patients and families confront cancer on a daily basis . While no one wants to be afraid, fear is a...
Read more →The public recently got to hear from Angelina Jolie about her decision to perform a double mastectomy in light of her having a genetic mutation in the BRCA1 gene. The op-ed piece in the New York Times received tremendous international attention – quickly spreading through the print, broadcast, online and social media world. The...
Read more →Recently, there was a poll that indicated that 40 percent of parents intended to not vaccinate their daughters against HPV due to health concerns (1). It seems likely that even less will choose to vaccinate their sons. Over the last 10-15 years, there has been an epidemic of cancers in the back of the...
Read more →With the recent news regarding Angelina Jolie’s courageous story, questions about breast cancer treatment as well as breast reconstruction have become common topics for discussion. Women who learned they have a mutation in the BRCA1 or BRCA2 genes have an approximately 5-fold increased risk of developing breast cancer. Another way to describe this would...
Read more →It’s that time of year … when the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) takes over the city of Chicago for its annual meeting at McCormick Place from May 31 – June 4, 2013. The ASCO Annual Meeting brings together more than 25,000 oncology professionals from a broad range of specialties, making it an...
Read more →A needle biopsy may not be enough to diagnose thyroid cancer: A needle biopsy of a suspicious area in the thyroid is an excellent initial method of identifying cancer in the thyroid gland. Cells collected using a small needle are examined under a microscope to determine whether a thyroid cancer is present. In many...
Read more →Angelina Jolie recently revealed in a NY Times Op-Ed on May 14, 2013 that she has been diagnosed with a mutation in the BRCA1 gene that greatly increases her risk for breast and ovarian cancer. She chose to undergo a risk reducing mastectomy to lessen her risk for breast cancer and underwent three months...
Read more →Lung cancer remains the biggest killer among all cancers. Unfortunately, by the time lung cancer leads to symptoms, the cancer is already in advanced stages about 75 percent of the time. But we can do more in the war against lung cancer. In previous years, multiple studies evaluating the use of screening by chest...
Read more →Malignant pleural mesothelioma is a thoracic disease process that affects those with prior inhalational exposure to asbestos. It originates in the pleural space and progresses by local extension to involve the ipsilateral lung and adjacent structures. Often, there is a very long and variable latency period (from exposure to disease manifestation) that can range...
Read more →Extremity sarcoma is one of the hardest cancers to treat. Treatment for patients where sarcoma is in an arm or a leg may include surgery, radiation therapy, chemotherapy, interferon therapy, biologic/immunotherapy and/or innovative therapies using new drugs to fight the disease. With Isolated Limb Infusion (ILI), the effects of chemotherapy can be concentrated regionally...
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