Evelyn, the Alaskan ice maiden!
New research
involving tens of thousands of women pinpoint 34 genes which, if disabled by
mutation, contribute to the probability of contracting ovarian cancer. While the discovery that there are so many
potential bad actors lurking in the genome may be discouraging, at least
knowing which they are facilitates concocting a personalized counterattack in the
event that cancer actually arises, as well as informing effective screening
procedures. One thing seems certain:
eradicating OVCA is going to require lots of data combined with computer smarts
– and it ain’t going to be cheap!
I hope none
of you ever need to know this stuff, but in the spirit of “better safe than
sorry”, Survivornet offers you a summary of the treatment you probably will
undergo in the event that OVCA makes its unwelcome advent in your life. Note that much of this was precisely what
Linda underwent, minus the “maintenance” (during remission) part. I would add that one should also pester one’s
oncologist about ongoing clinical trials; the pace of improvement in OVCA care
is improving rapidly, and you don’t want to miss out.
Finally, Dr.
Collins of NIH provides us with a comprehensible summary of how genome studies
are being used to underlie efforts to create individualized therapies for various
cancers. Dr. Collins uses our language uncommonly
well, so in general anything he writes will be worth reading. This little essay is unusually useful. In a way, however, it is a bit discouraging;
despite heroic and, certainly, extraordinarily costly curative protocols, “success”
appears to be measured in prolonged remission.
The word I am looking for – cure – still is nowhere to be found.
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