It’s summer folks, and you know what that means, right? A little sun, fun, and relaxation are on the way for many who intend to enjoy their vacation time with family friends, or simply alone. Many people will head out to the beach or the lake on the weekends, and that means getting a lot of sun exposure. But before you gas up the Chris Craft or jet skis just remember…put on the sun block, and put it on thick!
Skin cancer is a very real threat; probably more than you know, and the fact of the matter is, like it or not, it is something that any of us who live in the world (and are exposed to any sunlight) are at risk. Surprisingly, it is estimated that over 1 million new cases of skin cancer will be diagnosed in the United States alone this year, and it is believed that of those, approximately 68,000 will be the often-deadly, melanoma. Of those, about 8,000 will result in death. Melanoma is one of the deadliest forms of cancer and if it is not caught in the earliest stages, it is almost always fatal. Currently, there is no cure for the deadly cancer, but recently, a possible breakthrough has scientists and researchers on edge, wondering if a cure is on the horizon. The Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Washington, conducted a study which was based on an experimental immunotherapy treatment. One man involved in the study had a complete remission after receiving treatment, surprising and exciting researchers who have always believed that immunotherapy is the most promising treatment for late stage melanoma. The 52-year-old man, who is from Oregon, was given only one year to live before he received the immune-priming treatments, but doctors who conducted the study are reluctant to show their enthusiasm at their success since the man was the only one out of nine patients who had good results. Still, the treatment, reported in Thursday’s issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, is being counted as the latest in a small series of successes involving immune-priming treatments against deadly skin cancers. And although he had no role in the research, Dr. Darrell Rigel, a dermatology researcher at the New York University Cancer Institute in New York, says “Immunotherapy has become the most promising approach” to late-stage, death-sentence skin cancers. Although this is extremely good news, the immune-priming experiments have yet to yield a consistent therapy. The therapies, which have a long history behind them (20 years of research to be exact), have focused on souping up a certain kind of immune system cell — the “killer T cells” that envelop and kill foreign agents. But the new research at Hutchinson took a different approach. Scientists here focused instead on specific helper T cells that are adept at locking onto cancer cells and guiding the killer cells to their target. Researchers then drew blood from patients, located the special helper cells and then grew more of them in the laboratory. They then infused roughly 5 billion of the cells back into the patients — without chemotherapy or the other harsh drugs. “It’s a simpler and less toxic approach to melanoma than had been previously employed,” said Dr. Louis Weiner, director of the cancer center at Georgetown University. The fourth man in the study to be treated was the Oregon man, who was treated in 2005. Two months after, treatment scans revealed no tumors, even though the cancer was in its advanced stages and present in his back, groin and lungs at the time of the treatment. Two years after the treatment, he had no symptoms at all. The good part is, there were no side-effects to the treatment, unlike other cancer therapies. In addition, an analysis showed that his immune system had targeted not only one type of protein target on cancer cells, but two others as well. It is thought that the treatment revved up his immune system’s ability to expand his cancer-fighting ability in new ways. Unfortunately, though, the longer-term effects are not known at this time because the man fell completely out of touch with researchers and has declined any further interviews, making it impossible to follow-up on his progress. Still, it is inspiring news that we can all be excited about. But the Gorilla wants to warn you- wear that all-important sunscreen because many of us are getting to the age in which the lack of doing so earlier in life is literally biting us in the behind (and in other areas more exposed to the sun!). So have your good ole’ fun in the sun, but do it with sunscreen and a big fat hat on your head!