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15-year-old nabs $100,000 top prize in Intel-sponsored competition; his "dipstick" test is 90 percent accurate Jack Andraka. Andraka. "Keep that last name in mind. You're going to read about him a lot in the years to come. What I tell my lab is, 'Think of Thomas Edison and the light bulb.' This kid is the Edison of our times. There are going to be a lot of light bulbs coming from him." Those are bold words, bolder still given that their source is one of the top medical researchers in the nation. But Dr. Anirban Maitra, a pathology professor at...

Pancreatic cancer is one of the most difficult cancers to diagnose, often times not detected until the most advanced stages. However, new advances in medical science have provided a way to find pancreatic cancer before it spreads. New advances made by a 15-year-old Maryland high school student. North County freshman Jack Andraka earned the grand prize at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair for creating a test that can detect early stage pancreatic cancer with 90 percent accuracy and at a cheaper rate than other tests. “It detects an abnormal protein that you find in the blood when you...

He is only a freshman at North County High School in Anne Arundel County. However, 15-year-old Jack Andraka is being recognized for developing what may become an effective way to detect pancreatic cancer.

Breakfast lovers, beware. A new study found eating processed meats like bacon and sausage could increase your risk for deadly pancreatic cancer. For every piece of sausage or two strips of bacon a person eats every day, there's a 19 percent rise in risk for pancreatic cancer, the study found. "There is strong evidence that being overweight or obese increases the risk of pancreatic cancer and this study may be an early indication of another factor behind the disease," Dr Rachel Thompson, deputy head of science at The World Cancer Research Fund, told BBC News. For the study, researchers reviewed...

Researchers from the University and the Mayo Clinic in Arizona have developed a vaccine that dramatically reduces tumors in a mouse model that mimics 90 percent of human breast and pancreatic cancer cases—including those resistant to common treatments. The vaccine, described this week in the early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, reveals a promising new strategy for treating cancers that share the same distinct carbohydrate signature, including ovarian and colorectal cancers.

Two newer drugs used to treat Type 2 diabetes could be linked to a significantly increased risk of developing pancreatitis and pancreatic cancer, and one could also be linked to an increased risk of thyroid cancer, according to a new UCLA study. Researchers from the Larry L. Hillblom Islet Research Center at UCLA examined the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's database for adverse events reported between 2004 and 2009 among patients using the drugs sitagliptin and exenatide. They found a six-fold increase in the odds ratio for reported cases of pancreatitis with these drugs, compared with four other diabetes therapies...

CINCINNATI—A new study shows that vitamin D deficiency could be linked to the development and severity of certain autoimmune lung diseases. These findings are being reported in the Jan. 4 edition of the journal Chest. Brent Kinder, MD, UC Health pulmonologist, director of the Interstitial Lung Disease Center at the University of Cincinnati and lead investigator on the study, says vitamin D deficiencies have been found to affect the development of other autoimmune diseases, like lupus and type 1 diabetes. "We wanted to see if lack of sufficient vitamin D would also be seen in patients who are diagnosed with...

Most Americans and Canadians up to age 70 need no more than 600 international units (IUs) of vitamin D per day to maintain health, and those 71 and older may need as much as 800 IUs, says a new report from the Institute of Medicine. The amount of calcium needed ranges, based on age, from 700 to 1,300 milligrams per day... > A large amount of evidence, which formed the basis of the new intake values, confirms the roles of calcium and vitamin D in promoting skeletal growth and maintenance and the amounts needed to avoid poor bone health. >...

Ali Stunt stunned doctors when she beat the odds and survived pancreatic cancer. She talks to Elizabeth Grice about the need for early diagnosis. As soon as she regained consciousness, Ali Stunt checked the clock in the recovery room. It was 1.30pm. The time told her all she needed to know: instead of having been wheeled back to the hospital ward as inoperable, she’d had five hours of surgery to remove a cancerous growth in her pancreas. Bleary as she was, she understood the significance of waking up in the afternoon. “It meant they had managed to operate and that...

Wilma Mankiller, the once dirt-poor Oklahoma farm girl who grew up to become an American Indian and women’s rights activist, author and the first woman to hold the Cherokee Nation’s highest office, died Tuesday. She was 64.

Former Florida Senate President Jim King, who sometimes fought Gov. Jeb Bush and his own Republican Party over the Terri Schiavo right-to-die battle in 2005, died Sunday after a brief battle with pancreatic cancer, a family spokeswoman said. He was 69

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il has pancreatic cancer, South Korean broadcaster YTN said on Monday in an unsourced news flash. Kim's health is one of the most closely guarded secrets in the reclusive communist state. (Reporting by Jack Kim, Editing by Dean Yates)

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Enlarge ImageBlocked. Chemo drugs (green) can't penetrate a pancreatic tumor (blue). White stroma (insert) separates blood flow from tumor cells (light brown).Credit: Stefanie Reichelt, Michal Al Jacobetz, and Kenneth P. Olive; (inset) Kenneth P. Olive Almost 95% of pancreatic cancer patients die within 5 years of diagnosis, and traditional chemotherapy does little to save their lives. Now, cancer researchers think they know why--and how they might get around the tumor's defenses. The work "has huge ramifications for how we approach therapy of this disease," says Margaret Tempero, an oncologist at the University of California, San Francisco. Cancers almost always...

TALLAHASSEE -- State Sen. Jim King, a Jacksonville Republican and 22-year veteran of the Legislature, has been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, the lawmaker's longtime spokeswoman said Saturday. “During a recent routine post-legislative session checkup, Senator Jim King was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. While Senator King plans to seek additional medical counsel and aggressive treatment, he is aware that this particular type of cancer is difficult to treat and manage, and that the outcomes are, at best, guarded," said Sarah Bascom, a political consultant and longtime spokeswoman for King, in a statement.

ACTOR Patrick Swayze has reportedly started saying goodbye to family and friends after learning his cancer has spread to his liver. The Dirty Dancing and Ghost star, who in January was told he had pancreatic cancer, has started preparing himself for death, reports say "Patrick recently got word that the cancer had spread to his liver and that is what his doctors said would begin the countdown to the end," a source told National Enquirer magazine. "Patrick knew it was coming because he was suffering increased weakness. "At times, he was so weak that he could barely walk without feeling...

OKLAHOMA CITY — Doctors at the OU Cancer Institute announced Friday that they have discovered a way to find cancer stem cells in tumors, destroy them and keep them from reoccurring. The team of researchers, led by Dr. Courtney Houchen, M.D. and Shrikant Anant, Ph.D., are using the Mushashi-1 protein, which only appears in adult stem cells, to develop a compound that can kill the stem cells and cancer cells, while leaving normal cells untouched. This is the first time doctors have been able to separate the cancer forming stem cells from normal cells. Houchen said they are going after...

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - In mice implanted with human pancreatic cancer tumors, injecting live Streptococcus bacteria, similar to those that cause strep throat, directly into the tumors caused the tumors to shrink and die, German scientists report. "The utilization of live bacteria," as a danger signal, Dr. Claudia Maletzki told Reuters Health, "obviously has great potential for activating the immune system." Given the poor prognosis of patients with advanced pancreatic cancer, "novel" interventions are "imperative," Maletzki and colleagues at the University of Rostock note. In culture experiments, the researchers established that streptococcal bacterium known as S. pyogenes could mediate...

My mother, Connie Loughman, was diagnosed with Pancreatic Cancer in August 2007. As you may know (due to the media attention surrounding Patrick Swayze's diagnosis) Pancreatic Cancer has very high mortality rate since most patients are diagnosed at a late stage of the disease and there are few effective treatments. The courage and tenacity my mom has shown in this battle is more than even an adoring daughter like me could have ever hoped for. She has done all she can to fight this terrible disease but now it's my turn to show that same strength and determination and fight...

AURORA, Colo. (CBS4) ― There is new hope for patients diagnosed with inoperable pancreatic cancer. There's a new treatment being studied in Colorado and it has already cured one patient. Most patients diagnosed with pancreatic cancer die from it, but a national clinical trial has left Richard Jordan, from Fort Collins, cancer free. Jordan has defied the odds. Just over a year ago, he was diagnosed with inoperable pancreatic cancer -- the tumor was choking a major blood vessel. "You usually don't last more than six months," Jordan said. Doctors at the University of Colorado Cancer Center offered some hope....

Sorry for long title and caps. I am typing thru tears. My mom is dying of pancreatic cancer. She raised my son and I got thru to Red Cross & Hospice and they approved it. Military is denying it saying she is not loco parentis. On top of that nobody knows how to do the paper work. My son is her baby (30 Year Old Marine) and she is all she wants. Seems to be holding on for him. She just took a drastic turn for the worst yesterday. I need a congressman/senator anyone who I can call and try...

Source: Harvard School of Public Health Date: January 17, 2007 Link Found Between Periodontal Disease And Pancreatic Cancer Science Daily — Pancreatic cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer death in the U.S.; more than 30,000 Americans are expected to die from the disease this year. It is an extremely difficult cancer to treat and little is known about what causes it. One established risk factor in pancreatic cancer is cigarette smoking; other links have been made to obesity, diabetes type 2 and insulin resistance. In a new study, researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) and...

PHILADELPHIA -- Consumption of Vitamin D tablets was found to cut the risk of pancreatic cancer nearly in half, according to a study led by researchers at Northwestern and Harvard universities. The findings point to Vitamin D's potential to prevent the disease, and is one of the first known studies to use a large-scale epidemiological survey to examine the relationship between the nutrient and cancer of the pancreas. The study, led by Halcyon Skinner, Ph.D., of Northwestern, appears in the September issue of Cancer Epidemiology Biomarkers & Prevention. The study examined data from two large, long-term health surveys and found...

Excerpt - Luciano Pavarotti is recovering in New York after surgery for pancreatic cancer, Terri Robson, his London-based manager, announced today. The legendary 70-year-old tenor had been preparing to leave New York last week to perform in the U.K. when a routine medical test indicated he had a malignant pancreatic mass, which has been completely removed. "Pavarotti is recovering well and his physicians are encouraged by the physical and emotional resilience of their patient," Robson said in a statement. All remaining dates on his 2006 farewell tour have been cancelled, however. ~ snip ~

In one of the largest studies of its kind, UCSF researchers have found that eating lots of fruits and vegetables -- particularly vegetables -- is associated with about a 50 percent reduction in the risk of developing pancreatic cancer. Pancreatic cancer is difficult to diagnose and remains largely untreatable. It kills about 30,000 people in the U.S. each year and has a five-year survival under four percent. The vegetables most strongly associated with increased protection were onions, garlic, beans, yellow vegetables (such as carrots, yams, sweet potatoes, corn and yellow squash), dark leafy vegetables and cruciferous vegetables. Light-green vegetables, tomatoes...