A BOOK (well, small article) REPORT

1983, on Thera (Santorini)

The group I work with at the Hutch has as one of its principal interests the development of tests to permit early detection of ovarian cancer.  I have just run on a review article on the need for such tests for cancer in general.  In case you want to read it yourself, the citation (done like a geologist would do) is Etzione, R., et al, The case for early detection: Nature Reviews, v. 3, pp. (well, they don’t give the page numbers) April 2003.  It is well written, comprehensible for the most part, and blessedly short.  My only real complaint (more of a peevish quibble, really) is that it is hard to read on a computer.  For you Kindle experts it should be duck soup.

I have several things from this article to pass on.  By this time it should not be necessary for me to remind you that I am a geologist, not a biochemist, and may occasionally (or more often ?) get things wrong.  This is your last warning; don’t believe anything I say without serious thought, and don’t act on anything I say without consulting an expert.

The first thing, I can’t get wrong.  The authors present us with a graph showing the 5- and 10-year survival frequencies of victims of breast, colorectal, lung and prostate chance, contrasting these frequencies in people whose cancers were discovered when they were localized with frequencies after the cancer had spread.  As you might expect, the former had a much better result than the latter.  Consider breast cancer for example.  For women diagnosed in the period 1993-97, the five-year survival frequency was about 20% if the cancer had spread (was “distant”) but 95% if it hadn’t (was “local”).  For prostate cancer the benefit of early detection was even more pronounced.  Even lung cancer showed this trend, but the actual numbers were pretty dismal.  My take-home from this is that what we (my group, at the Hutch) are doing is worth the time, effort and money – and then some.

Those same graphs showed how survival numbers increased in the interval  1972 to about 1997.  This must reflect improvements in treatment – drugs, radiation, surgery, voodoo, whatever.  There was noticeable, consistent improvement shown – but in terms of  years of life saved it couldn’t compare to the benefit of early detection. 

I have a few more things to say, but I am getting impatient with my typing problems and a gin and tonic is waiting.  I may post more on this article in a day or two.